Deborah Meaden first appeared as an investor in series 3 of the BBC television series Dragon's Den.
Meaden joined the programme after the original series and became one of its longest-serving and most recognisable investors. Her business background includes experience in leisure, retail and hospitality, which shaped the types of ventures she examined in the Den.
Viewers sometimes place her arrival in series 2 because the early seasons were broadcast close together and the investor panel changed during the show's first years. Series number is the precise distinction: her debut was in the third series, not the opening line-up.
Her long tenure helped make her associated with the programme's later identity. Nevertheless, she was not the only woman to invest on the show, and she was not the first female investor; that distinction belongs to original Dragon Rachel Elnaugh.