Destined for Greatness
From a fall before the dragons, to a board games Empress, entrepreneur Rachel Lowe tells Matthew Fairhurst how her ‘nothing is impossible’ attitude and desire to truthfully celebrate strong women has lead her into luxury gifts market
with an idea to revolutionise the tired board game industry. Eagerly in search of £75,000 to help her
I
company, RTL Games Ltd, produce her tourism based family game - Destination London, where players compete as taxi drivers to acquire play money by moving from destination to destination using dice - unfortunately, after a rough jostle with technology mogul Doug Richard over potential figures, she found herself in the fast lane to rejection.
40
waterfrontmagazines.co.uk
n 2004, a young and ambitious Rachel Lowe marched, with dreams in hand, into the merciless lair of BBC hit investment show, Dragons’ Den,
Such a cold rebuffing has seen the end to the hopes and dreams of so many, but Lowe’s unrelenting ambition wouldn’t let her stop there, and in the same year, Destination London made its way to the esteemed shelves of London toy giants Hamleys, quickly outselling Monopoly and Twister to become the UK’s number 1 selling board game. Eight years on, she still has no regrets from her failed attempt to slay dragons. When asked what the Rachel Lowe of today would say to the Rachel Lowe who first set out to fund her enterprise, she answered, “Rachel Lowe today would say, ‘Don’t change a thing!’ I don’t regret anything and even not knowing my numbers at the time just made the episode more entertaining. I think having
naivety on my side helped to get through it. No fear of failing, just blind ambition!” Her all conquering spirit has led to immeasurable highs, which include the release of almost 20 variations of her game and being awarded the MBE for services to business in 2009. But it seemed like the fairy tale was over when the release of Harry Potter themed, Destination Hogwarts, due to coincide with the release of the blockbuster movie Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, was forced to put back their release date, leaving RTL Games Ltd unable to recoup their funds in time resulting in Rachel heavy heartedly folding the company. As we know from her Dragon’s Den put down, Lowe had all the makings of a born winner, and
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76