Tonight's Britain's Next Big Thing BBC2 12th April 2011 with Theo Paphitis

Great first programme tonight. Tonight's Britain’s Next Big Thing BBC2 12th April 2011 with Theo Paphitis Following budding entrepreneurs striving to get their products to market. Amongst those pitching to Liberty's buyers, at the London event were

Wendy Murray and Sharon Pringle showing their scarves,

Charlotte Sales showcasing her beautiful hand made glassware,

Richard Weston showed his unique prints with designs from scans of all different minerals,

Stephen Morgan and Robin Shannon of Show & Tell Design demonstrated their unique lamps.

Sisters Maria & Sophie Law showed a selection of their young girls sports bras

Tom Hopkins Gibson showed his selection of hand crafted bowls made from driftwood

All in all there were an estimated 600 hopefuls pitching to buyers Julie Hanson, Yasmin, Eleanor, and Alexandria amongst many others for the opportunity to get to the second round and pitch directly to Ed Burstell, the Buying Director.

For those that Liberty's are interested in doing business with, next week we will see how they fare when the Liberty buyers visit their potential suppliers business premises.

Also, next week we will see a similar process of entrepreneurs pitching to Boots at their Nottingham HQ.  The Boots buying team with Annabel Franks, Alison Atkinson and colleagues hold huge power as they buy on behalf of 2500 high street stores and could buy the products that will create £30 to 40 million of sales.

Exciting times for these people that have the ideas, facilities and courage to get their products to market. For others that don't have the ideas there is still an opportunity to develop their own business: visit http://bit.ly/NxtBgThg for further information and the opportunity to start a business of your own.