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Tell me how the idea came about. Apparently your friend had their bag stolen from the beach…

ITSA... MULTI-FUNCTION SUNLOUNGER TOWEL

David: That was part of it. We added a hidden, zipped pocket at the foot end because of that. It’s my personal favourite, as it means one of us does not have to wait by our beach bag in case some opportunist thief comes along. I am not saying it's secure, but it is out of sight, and if you fold it underneath then it's secured by the ties that link to the lounger.

On one occasion my book got wet on a cruise ship. And another time, we were on holiday and Sarah lost her watch, which she had left on a table by the sun loungers. That’s why we put pockets on the itsa.

There’s another pocket for an iPod. The loops on the itsa stop it from getting all tangled up, falling in the sand and getting wet.

Another thing, because it fits over the edge of the lounger, you don’t have a towel slipping down the lounger – which was another pet hate of mine.

IT'S NOW A... BEACH BAG

Another pet hate: the sun moves around! It takes forever to pick up your bits and move your bed. Not anymore: it takes about seven seconds to pack your itsa up, so if you get a rain storm – no more wet towel while you pack up your bits.

So it was a number of reasons – all of our pet hates really.

The itsa was inspired by personal experience, so it’s no surprise that it solves practical problems…

David: And I think because we were semi-retired we had lots of time to think about the product, as well as to plan things and carry them out.

Unfortunately, people often don’t go through with ideas because they’re too busy chasing the pound note. But it’s not that they don’t have the time: they don’t know how to manage their time.

You won a Double Gold Award for Innovation of the Year at the British Invention Show. Did you feel vindicated after things didn’t go as well as hoped on the BBC show Dragon’s Den?

David: I didn’t have a problem with what happened on that show. It’s good television and it gives you a high profile for your product.

But it’s no good relying on that anyway. You need to get the product into other parts of the press – other TV shows, radio, magazines. We appeared on GMTV, for instance.

So what happened in the ‘Den’?

David: We gave them good business information but we weren’t giving them the television that they wanted. They wound me up and I lost my rag. If the ground could have swallowed me up when I saw it on television then I would have been happy.

We would have loved to get the money – but you have to have other plans in place to get the money.

So how did you raise the money in the end?

David: We remortgaged the house.

How did you come up with the ‘itsa’ name?

David: The problem we had was: What is the product? It just didn’t exist.

It’s not a beach bag; it’s not a towel; it’s not a sun lounger cover. But on the other hand – it’s all those things.

How do you sell the itsas?

David: Only online.

The itsa is also being promoted in the promotional incentives market by a company called Originally Different Limited. It’s a massive market; so many businesses like to give products away to clients or staff to promote their brand. We’re expecting revenues of about a million pounds in the first year, in that market alone.

The itsa is new and unique so you can be fairly confident at Christmas that your relative won’t already have one…

David: It’s a great Christmas present. We took the stand to the Brentwood Christmas Fayre to test the market. We sold out by 2pm on day two.

We took 150 to the invention show and sold out, which was impressive, because people go there to look at inventions, not to buy anything.

40% of our customers are actually men. It’s partly, I think, men buying them as presents for wives, girlfriends, sisters or mothers.

SARAH AND DAVID

Apart from each other, who would you say has helped you the most?

David: The family have been fantastic, believers in us as well as the product. My father-in-law, came up with some good ideas, such as our slogan “everything to hand, nothing in the sand’.

My mother-in-law sewed the first itsa together out of towels bought from Waitrose the day after we had the idea.

Assuming she doesn’t still make all the itsas, where are your manufacturers?

David: China. I would love to get my products made in Europe, but the industry isn’t there anymore.

And because our product is so new, it isn’t easy to make it; there are four factories involved.

My lawyer’s nephew lived in China and spoke the language. So we have an English guy who speaks Chinese, with Chinese partners who speak perfect English. They do all our quality control.

Within a week of speaking to them they spoke to all our Chinese manufacturing contacts and got them to drop their prices by 40%.

But you need to be careful who you trust. The reason I’m dealing with this guy is that he’s the nephew of a lawyer I have known for 30 years.

I heard some horror stories at the invention show. I met a 75-year-old guy who had given £5k to a business consultant and I thought “he hasn’t got a cat in hell’s chance of getting his product to market”. And that’s in England – it’s going to be more risky in China.

What’s the best thing about running your own business?

David: Negotiating the deals.

It could be anything from the manufacturing process up to the sales process. It can mean putting funding together, doing letters of credit – all the deals that make a business successful.

And the worst bits?

David: This sounds corny, but there aren’t any! If there are then do something about it, or go and get a job!

Do you have any long-term aims for the business?

David: For this product raise more money for good causes than any other promotional product in the world.

My number one goal is to make a promo product very cheaply for big companies. 80% of the profits from that would go to good causes chosen by the companies.

I’d also like to raise £500k a year to buy £4.5k titanium steel wheelchairs for paraplegics, in memory of my brother, who sadly passed away recently.

I’m not in this business for personal gain. My advice is: don’t think about making money – that will follow if you focus on what needs to be done.

Any other advice for aspiring entrepreneurs?

David: If you are going into a competitive field – and we’re not – find out what the successful competitors are doing. Copy it and improve it.

Think outside of the box. People in big corporations don’t always think outside the box – they have their existing suppliers and they don’t want to rock the boat. They see a lot of people each day – so think about what you can do to be different.

And if you’re rejected at one level by a buyer, then don’t be scared to go higher.

When you’re pushing for business, be aggressive; don’t be frightened. Mr Nice Guy gets an “oh, I’ll think about it”. If you’ve given all the good reasons to get a “yes” – don’t accept anything less.

And never accept “I will call you” – they rarely do and often don’t remember you.

Don’t rely on email or faxing; good old-fashioned letters to the right person work better.

If anyone is negative around you, get rid of them. Do not surround yourself with timewasters and going-nowhere-fast people. Unfortunately, a lot of new entrepreneurs listen to either negative people or ‘yes’ people, who tell them they’re great all the time – and that’s no good either.

At the end of every day, you should feel that you have accomplished something.

Never put off doing paperwork and other administration – but only do it in non-selling times, until you have someone to help you.

You have to do PR, but don’t rely on them to do it all, you are not their only client. You need to think about new angles, because that’s not their job – you have to feed them.

When we had our computer consumables business we would give away a little cream egg with orders for toner cartridges. Our sales went up 100%. They could buy the egg for 30p in the shops, but because it was something for nothing…

Work out the annual profits you need to break even. Divide this figure by the number of days you have in a year to achieve that. Set your daily target, but double what you need. Work out how many deals you need to strike and then the hours you need to sell a day to achieve that.