She nailed it! Gina lands herself a deal in the Dragons’ Den

An ex-investment banker turned beauty entrepreneur accepted an offer for a £100k joint investment from BBC Dragons’ Den stars Sara Davies and Deborah Meaden for her manicure business.

Gina Farran, from Southwark, accepted the deal to help expand her enterprise in exchange for eight per cent of her at-home manicure business, which uses patent-pending ‘technailogy’ to custom-size stick-on gel nails.

Gina, who grew up in Lebanon, but now lives in Walworth, near Elephant and Castle, quit her high-flying career at Goldman Sachs to build Glaize after struggling to find the time to get her nails done, with the belief that there had to be a better way to get the perfect manicure.

She appeared on the show aired on Thursday to secure backing for her nail care business, which is designed to revolutionise the industry by offering customers a more convenient, sustainable and damage-free way of going about it.

Glaize offers made-to-measure and standard-sized stick-on gel nails, as well as nail art stickers. The company has developed its own 30-40 per cent bio-based gel formulation from scratch, and makes all of its stick-on gels in-house, in its London factory.

Glaize’s custom-sized gels are made to customers’ unique nail sizes and shapes, using their patent-pending ‘technailogy’ to create a custom-fit, with just four photos of your hands

Sara Davies jumped at the chance to invest, and was the first Dragon to make an offer, facing competition from Peter Jones, Touker Suleyman and Deborah Meaden, who were also impressed.

Gina said: “Being part of Dragons’ Den has been an incredible experience, and receiving such positive feedback from some of the UK’s most prominent businesspeople is a huge honour.”

She added: “Seeing Peter Jones wearing pink Glaize gel nails has to be one of my highlights!”

You can watch Gina Farran face the Dragons on BBC iPlayer.

Pictured top: Gina in the Dragons’ Den (Picture: BBC)