Tell us your business success story – how did you make it in business? How did you make it a success – we want to know.

Success Stories
We have chosen a couple of success stories to start this off – two well known entrepreneurs Ducan Bannatyne and Sir Richard Branson.

Duncan Bannatyne

Bannatyne was raised in the town of Clydebank and from a relatively poor family. Bannatyne at the young age of 15 volunteered for a 12 year stint in the Royal Navy as a engineering mechanic or stoker. He served several years before receiving a dishonourable discharge for attempting to throw an officer off a boat landing jetty in Scotland.

In his biography he claims this was in part a dare, but also in reaction to this officer’s abuse of his authority. Bannatyne had become disillusioned and wanted out of the Navy anyway. Bannatyne was just 19 when this happened, after which he had to serve 9 months in the Colchester military detention centre before being discharged aged 20.

Bannatyne spent the most of his twenties moving from job to job and lived for a few years on the island of Jersey, which is where he met his first wife Gail.

At the age of 29 Bannatyne moved to Stockton-on-Tees with Gail when his business career started almost immediately when he purchased an ice cream van for just £450. Bannatyne expanded his business by buying more vans and eventually sold the business for £28,000 after founding a nursing home business Quality Care Homes.

Bannatyne sold his Quality Care Homes for £46 million in 1996 and children’s nursery chain Just Learning for £22 million. Since then Bannatyne has expanded into Health Clubs using the Bannatyne name to name the chain of clubs, bars, hotels and property.

After recently acquiring 26 Health Clubs from Hilton Hotels, Bannatyne’s is now the largest independent chain of Health Clubs in the United Kingdom!

Bannatyne’s current wealth has been estimated at around £310 million, as indicated in 2008 by the Sunday Times Rich List!

Sir Richard Branson

Branson had his first successful business venture at the age of 16 when he started a record business by purchasing crates of “cut-out” records from a record discounter. Branson sold the records out of the boot of his car to retail outlets in London and then continued to sell cut-outs through mail order business during 1970.

He traded at this early stage under the name “Virgin” (which was used because the records were sold in new condition) and he sold records for a lot less than the “High Street” outlets and in particular W. H. Smith.

Branson eventually started a record shop in Oxford Street in London and not long thereafter launched his record label Virgin Records. Branson earned enough money from his record store to buy a country estate where he installed a recording studio. Branson’s for his Virgin brand includes his well known airline and holiday company, credit cards, mobile phones with over 360 companies. Richard Branson is the presently the 236th richest person (according to Forbes’ 2008 list of billionaires). Branson is estimated to be worth approximately $7.9 billion USD (£4.4 Billion)

Have you got a business story to tell? I know that when I read success stories they help me to move forward. I recently read an article about Duncan Bannatyne and how he made his millions from selling ice cream to a multi-million pound fitness, property and hotel empire and these stories always give me inspiration!

So we want to hear from you – your successes and your failures – the details of what you did right in business and where you went wrong. All the gory details please!