Last season 2 open audition for Dragons’ Den

The last Season 2 open audition for Dragons’ Den finished in Calgary this morning. Thanks to Vincenzo, Sean, and Mike, we were able to squeeze all 14 entrepreneurs into the audition this morning.

On this last day, I saw some familiar faces. One of the face was Jonathan Levine from season one. Now, I won’t tell if he gets to pitch in Toronto. So you will have to watch S02 to find out if he gets on to face the dragons or not. (big smile)

Another face is a young entrepreneurial friend of mine — Mark. He kept bugging me and wanting to pitch on Dragons’ Den. So I told him about the open audition. Now, the reason I blogged about him here is not because he is my friend. It is because what many entrepreneurs can learn from Mark, I think.

You see, Mark’s pitch got chewed up pretty badly (and rightly so) by Vincenzo and Sean. (Note: As Mark’s friend, I chewed him up in advance already and told him that he might not be ready but should still come to get his experience.)

Anyway, Mark and I talked afterwards and he agreed that his pitch was quite bad. He started weak and went down hill (way too technical) from there. But at the same time, Mark told me he had learned so much from his bad pitch. And the feeling he got from this morning’s pitch has confirmed his belief and desire to be an entrepreneur. You see, the lesson here is Mark takes away a positive experience from a pretty bad pitch. Whereas some other entrepreneurs are more easily blinded by anger or the feeling of defeat and they went into their comfortable defensive mode. By the way, if you want to see Mark’s 10+ minutes demo of his software SideFinder, you can check out my report of DemoCampCalgary1 (his demo video is #2). You see, his business pitch might suck, but his software is kinda neat and powerful.

Finally, I would like to end this post by sharing a great and inspiring story of entrepreneurial spirit with you. I am truly inspired by the 86 years young inventor — Michele. He invented a snow shovel that he still uses to shovel snow by himself at the young age of 86! Michele may not have a full business plan to sell his invention or prices determined yet. But he had enough of a business mind to have applied and received patents from both US and Canada. Great job!

Having had Michele explained and showed me his snow shovel twice (he was there in the April pitch), I promised myself that I am going to get my lazy S off the sofa and try to work towards getting my name on a patent or two (with lots of help from others, of course).

By the way, Michele’s grand daughter is really cute (she posed in one of the picture with the shovel). Unfortunately for me, she is way too young. (smile) On a more serious business note, instead of his grand-daughter, Michele should have a video of him made that shows he, at age 86, shoveling snow with ease! And that will be a great selling tool for the seniors (or even lazy S like me as we all want to be able to shovel snow easily and without expensing much effort. How much more effective can it be with a video of Michele shoveling snow himself at age 86? Just my 2 cents.

Here is a picture of the charming, inventive, and 86 years young Michele and me.

Update: Thanks to Jonathan for noticing my spelling mistakes. I know I have no hope in hell to win a spelling bee, but my spelling mistakes still make me looks more idiotic than usual. (smile)