Business Nightmares: Hitting rock bottom and coming out on top [Paperback]

A valuable check-list of what not to do in business, and how to create plans for worst-case scenarios --Esquire Elnaugh talks frankly about her fall from grace --Virgin Radio A warning of the bear traps that wait in line for business owners --Stephanie Welstead, Growing Business magazine

Popular title now available in paperback, priced £7.99

Rachel Elnaugh, entrepreneur and founder of Red Letter Days, announces her book Business Nightmares. Brought to fame as the original female Dragon in the BBC TV cult business show Dragons' Den, Rachel had achieved success at the helm of the a multi-million-pound company. Here, for the first time in her own words, Rachel speaks about her dramatic fall from grace and the spectacular, high-profile collapse of her market-leading business, Red Letter Days. Rachel has used her experiences to persuade 20 of the world’s most successful business personalities including Jeffrey Archer, Simon Woodroffe, Doug Richard and Gerald Ratner to talk about their own troubled times in business. Here in Business Nightmares they divulge what it felt like in their darkest hour, and how they faced the dawn…

I have never met a multi-millionaire in my life who hasn't lost everything before. Never. The secret is to never mention it.
Jeffrey Archer

Rachel has been through more than most people in several lifetimes; you can learn a lot from those who have been on a cliff edge. I have great respect for what she has to say.
Simon Woodroffe

Rachel is a survivor who has used each experience as a learning curve. She understands that there is no failure or success, but simply opportunities to grow and learn.
Lynne Franks

Despite the title Business Nightmares, I always intended this to be a very positive business book, since it is not only about problems in business (there will always be problems in business) but crucially about how those problems were overcome. The stories here, all about self-made entrepreneurs, illustrate that amazing things can ultimately emerge from times of great business struggle. Every entrepreneur I have written about in these pages is incredibly successful, and yet each has encountered serious trials and setbacks during their business journey. In researching this book, it became clear to me that there isn't a business-person alive who has had an entirely smooth ride. In fact, I would venture to suggest that it is actually adversity itself which is the catalyst that hardens those who are tough enough to survive it from being just business wannabes, to becoming the most brilliant entrepreneurs of our age. I was originally inspired to write this book by the many entrepreneurs who confided in me about their own problems in business following the meltdown of my own company Red Letter Days in 2005. When the end finally came (and bear in mind I had just given birth to my fourth son a week before; a priceless consolation if ever there was one), instead of the anticipated depression of `losing it all', I actually felt a huge liberation; I was free of the struggle, and, at last, didn't have to get up and go into battle every day. It's surprising what we cling to in life for so long, when in fact what we should be doing is simply letting go. When I did finally `let go', the most amazing things started to happen. Along with all sorts of new opportunities and offers came a whole stream of messages of support completely out of the blue, many of them from other high-profile entrepreneurs, sharing with me their own nightmare business experiences that they had endured along the way. Stories that had been carefully played out behind the scenes and kept out of the press, from people who I had previously (mistakenly) thought had enjoyed a one-way ticket to success, without any of the struggle I had gone through. If only I had known and could have spoken to those people when I was going through my problems, perhaps everything would have turned out differently. It occurred to me that this was a huge problem in the way business is reported - particularly in the UK. The successes and the glories are all played up to maximise the positive PR, while the real problems and struggles are swept under the carpet. The modern-day media love the `rags to riches' business fairytale story. So when entrepreneurs start to hit problems in their own business journeys, they start to think they are doing something terribly wrong. The fact is that business is a learning experience from day one - there is no point at which you can actually sit back and relax, free from problems and worries. There are issues to be dealt with and often serious crises to manage every step of the way, no matter what stage you are at. Crucially, those challenges are actually a vital part of the excitement of being an entrepreneur.

After A crisis how do you pick yourself up? Rachel Elnaugh founded Red Letter Days and was the original female Dragon on the BBC's cult show Dragons' Den. But while filming the second series, and heavily pregnant with her fourth child, behind the scenes she was fighting to save her business. And then it spectacularly collapsed. For the first time, Rachel speaks about her high-profile fall from grace and how she fought her way back up. Not alone, Rachel has also persuaded successful business personalities to talk about their own troubled times. They divulge how they felt in their darkest hour, how they bounced back, and what they learnt along the way ... revealing the very human side of business nightmares. Featuring: Jeffrey Archer Gerald Ratner Donald Trump Simon Woodroffe Doug Richard

Rachel Elnaugh is one of the UK's most high-profile entrepreneurs and often features in business news. She is well known publicly as the original female dragon, who advised and invested in small businesses on the BBC's popular show Dragons' Den. However, Rachel's name really hit the business headlines in 2005, when her business, Red Letter Days spectacularly collapsed. The irony of this business failure was splashed across national newspapers and television. Today she is a successful mentor and consultant to a number of small businesses, as well as being an accomplished business speaker at events across the UK. Most recently, Rachel has drawn upon her experiences to write her amazing new book: Business Nightmares. Losing Red Letter Days was a nightmare time for Rachel and her family. Not only had she suddenly lost her business and income and was having to cope with the intrusion of reporters outside her house, but she was also seven months pregnant with her fourth child. Both Rachel and her children also endured the humiliation of watching her demise broadcasted on national television. To understand the extent that Rachel's business tragedy affected life for herself and her family, and to learn how she overcame it, read Business Nightmares now.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. MY STORY SO FAR I always knew when I was growing up above my dad's electrical shop in Chelmsford, Essex, that one day I would run my own business. While other girls were out playing with their friends during the school holidays, I was down in dad's shop, sitting at the cashier's desk counting the money, or sorting out the light bulbs into a neat order. Every Christmas my mum and I would set up a little table in the shop from which we would sell homemade crackers, gift tags made from old Christmas cards and various other seasonal paraphernalia, all in aid of charity. Every time we made a sale it was hugely exciting to me, like a little piece of gratification, a bit of positive feedback, and a clue to what the customer wanted to buy. I was starting to get hooked on ways to sell more and more. So I turned up production on the most successful cracker colours and phased out the ones no one wanted. Much of my childhood was spent with my mum at various wholesalers and manufacturers, buying paper, packaging, novelties and various off-cuts, which we could somehow use to make things to sell on our Christmas table. We would spray twisted willow silver and attach tiny baubles for table ornaments. Everything we sold went into Christmas bags that I had made. I would also be assigned to various tasks to help my mum with my dad's business administration, like folding invoices to go into envelopes and sticking the stamps on ready to post. When I was a bit older, I started helping with the accounts and bookkeeping, managing the client ledger and sending out reminders to people who hadn't paid. I had all sorts of career ideas when I was at school - I wanted to become a journalist, an astrologer, and work in the art world. Being an entrepreneur was never on the radar of the career options at school and so at first I embarked on the traditional route that was expected of me by the girls' grammar school I went to, and I applied to university to study history of art. Having received rejections from all the universities concerned (not least because I subsequently found out that my headmistress had written on my UCCA form that I `excelled at mathematics'), I decided to start applying for management training courses instead. Rejection letter after rejection letter followed (and that was from those companies that actually bothered to reply to my feeble applications). In fact I received so many rejection letters I could have wallpapered my bedroom with them. Although I didn't realise it at the time, I was already receiving my first lesson in business - how to keep going despite rejection. Eventually, in desperation, I replied to a little advert in the local paper asking for an office junior to work in a local firm of accountants for just £2,750 per year. My experience working in my dad's business clinched it for me, and when I received the offer letter I was the happiest girl in the world. Someone actually wanted me at last! So I got my foot on the ladder and worked my way up from doing the filing and making coffee to doing tax returns for wealthy individuals and small-business owners. I took my taxation exams by correspondence course and eventually ventured up to the City, where I landed a job specialising in the taxation of Lloyd's Underwriters. This was the time of the PCW scandals at Lloyd's, and even though I hated every moment that I spent at that firm (thanks mainly to a bitch of a boss, who made my time there a living hell through consistent and relentless criticism of everything I did), the experience I gained helped me get a much better role at Arthur Andersen, which was at the time the biggest accountancy firm in the world. Those two and a half years I spent at Andersen's in my early twenties were probably the most important work experience of my life. They taught me the value of thinking big, and they also introduced me to the world of fabulously wealthy clients, including the entrepreneurs Sir Terence Conran and Anna Vinton who founded Reject Shop. I have always been in awe of celebrities (maybe it's because I'm an Essex girl), but it was a real thrill getting into the lift and finding yourself alongside someone really famous like Bryan Ferry or Joan Collins, who were among Andersen's clients at the time.

I have never met a multi-millionaire in my life who hasn't lost everything before. Never. The secret is to never mention it. Jeffrey Archer Rachel has been through more than most people in several lifetimes; you can learn a lot from those who have been on a cliff edge. I have great respect for what she has to say. Simon Woodroffe Rachel is a survivor who has used each experience as a learning curve. She understands that there is no failure or success, but simply opportunities to grow and learn. Lynne Franks