Newbridge business woman Noelle O'Connor the first EVER entrepreneur to appear on Dragons' Den - TWICE!

​TanOrganic’s Noelle O’Connor is undoubtedly one of the most successful entrants ever to face the Irish panel on Dragons' Den.  This weekend, she will again face the Dragons but this time it will be before the UK’s  judges on Dragons' Den on Sunday next, to air on BBC 2 at 8pm. Will the Dragons invest? Miss O'Connor was interviewed this am by RTÉ's Miriam O'Callaghan on Radio 1 and whilst she refused to confirm the outcome, she did confirm "They were fighting over me, and  fighting amongst themselves, something the Irish Dragons would never do!" Miss O'Connor's achievement is a first, that is, she is the entrepreneur to enter Dragons’ Den for a second time. The Kildare woman who founded TanOrganic (and Ealu Beauty) first appeared on RTÉ’s Dragons’ Den in 2010 where she secured investment from Presidential hopeful, Gavin Duffy. Now she takes on the five UK Dragons on BBC 2, in a bid for mentoring and investment from one of them to help expand her mult-imillion euro business further. Back in 2010, when Noelle sealed the deal for TanOrganic with Gavin Duffy As a result of Noelle’s stint on RTÉ’s Dragons’ Den, TanOrganic sales were catapulted to an astonishing €1m within three months. Since then TanOrganic has become one of the most successful tanning products ever launched, growing at a phenomenal rate, with sales doubling each year. The success of TanOrganic, Miss O'Connor maintained was that it was designed for the pale complexion of Irish women. It does not have a dark, deep tanning agent - it can be applied by sheets and overnight, women will find they have a very natural, light tan. Nothing false or fake, just a healthier tanned tone to their skin (no Orang-u-tan orange!). How will this savvy businesswoman fare when she meets the five dragons - Deborah Meaden, Peter Jones, Jenny Campbell, Tej Lalvani and Touker Suleyman - on 19 August next? ‘I am not a shy person,’ Noelle reveals. ‘I have crawled over glass to get where I am today and have become a tougher person. But I couldn’t believe how traumatising I found it seeing the five Dragons in front of me and my emotion got the better of me. It was a very different experience from my first in Ireland’ Her appearance on Dragons’ Den Ireland launched her brand, TanOrganic which is now sold in leading pharmacies along with being sold on board airlines  AerLingus, Transavia, RyanAir, and Virgin Airlines. ‘I will always be very grateful to Dragons’ Den and Gavin Duffy, who invested €50,000 in the business for a 45% share in 2010.  I have since bought him out, which is probably just as well as he is now very much focused on his campaign to become the next President of Ireland’. But it wasn’t always plain sailing for Noelle as she was faced with the potential closure of her chain of beauty salons. The beauty salon industry suffered badly during the economic recession and Noelle was confronted with the difficult decision of choosing between closing the salons that she had worked so hard for, or continuing to lose money. She chose the former and decided to start again from square one. Noelle went back to education and enrolled in the Boston MIT Entrepreneurial Masters Program. This proved the turning point for her and marked the new beginnings of TanOrganic. Her timing couldn’t have been better: the sun-kissed look was in and people were looking for a much needed natural alternative to High Street tanning products.  Noelle’s launch of TanOrganic also provided a safe and natural alternative to sun tanning in a country where the sun shines less frequently! TanOrganic is the world's first and only Eco-certified organic self-tanning brand and the highest rated self tan with a score of 9.7 on Trustpilot. "We are the only self tan with full Vegan Society, Leaping Bunny Cruelty Free and Ecocert certifications with a 100% score with the ethical association. Only 6 cosmetic companies globally have this score" added Noelle "In 2015, TanOrganic got great exposure from the ‘Save Our Skin Campaign’ in London, which raised awareness for Black Ribbon Melanoma Awareness". TanOrganic still holds the title for the most successful Dragons’ Den Ireland product with €1 Million in sales within the first 3 months of trading. Amongst its accolades are winning ‘Best Fake Tan’ at the Natural Health International Beauty Awards in 2015 and the ‘Irish Times Best Tan’ award. TanOrganic Self Tan Oil is the top-selling tanning product on the TUI Group Airlines and is also in the top three of all cosmetic and skincare products overall in the UK & Ireland. Miss O'Connor hails originally from Newbridge with many of her extended family also in business: Paul O'Connor, the Herb Shop; Maxine O'Connor, Interior Designer; O'Connor Upholstery, and many more - the business genes are clearly in the family DNA! Tune in on Sunday night to see how Noelle does - BBC 2 at 8pm on Sunday next!