Help Esprit secure a $250000 Investment... seriously!
Posted: Sat Jul 28, 2012 5:56 am
Hello Everyone,
I know the title sounds unbelievable but we have just fallen into an amazing opportunity.
Last week we were filmed for a TV show called The Big Decision. The show connects entrepreneurs with "Angel" investors... and a woman named Arlene Dickenson chose us as a company to consider investing in.
The filming has gone very well and I believe she is engaged and intrigued by Esprit's philosophy of valuing finance, community and ecology as equally important ways of measuring our success.
We applied to be on the show as we have had a challenging year. As many of you know we suspended our Mexico season last year due to security problems. It was a very hard decision for us to do so as Mexico really is our second home... no to mention the loss of our winter revenue. We are however, both an informed and responsible outfitter and made the right decision to suspend our programs to see if the security issue would settled down. Unfortunately, it has not settled down so we will be suspending our programs to Mexico for 2012/2013 as well.
So... as we had people booked... we switched gears and went to Costa Rica instead. Driving to Costa Rica had its challenges (floods, landslides, bribes etc....) all with a mountain of boats, my wife Barbara and our young son Taigan. Regardless, we made it despite the challenges and operated in Costa Rica for 2 months before disaster struck. After a routine service on our van... it burst into flames while the three of us were driving. Barbara grabbed Taigan and ran to safety, I tried to put the flames out to no avail. We lost everything including cameras, computers, wallets, credit cards, 4 Brand new L'Edges and an Ion as well as everything that Taigan owned... all his clothes, car seat, stroller and his "bunny".
Two days later we picked up the Isbells and continued to operate for 5 weeks straight (including filming of Canoe Movie 2) while renting vehicles and great expense.
We flew home to Canada, drove to Mexico, filmed the Big Banana and returned for the Canadian season with our credit maxed out.
Our compelling story landed us an opportunity on the show. So far the filming has gone very well and Arlene "The Dragon" (from a show called Dragon's Den) has given us 5 challenges, they are:
Entrepreneur Arlene Dickenson will consider a $250000 investment in Esprit if I can.
1. Increase repeat and referred bookings by 30%.
2. Get Esprit featured in 4 media outlets.
3. Find a business mentor.
4. Host a large Community Event.
5. Book 20 people for Costa Rica.
The C boat Community can help us with # 1 and #5.
It would be an enormous help to us if supporters could "book a trip to Costa Rica". It requires a $250 deposit which is 100% refundable up to 60 days prior to trip departure. If we get more than 20 reservations before Aug. 6 we complete challenge # 5. If you have travelled with us before... then you are helping us with #1 as well. If you need to cancel... after Aug 6 no problem... if you choose to join us we will give you $100 off the trip cost... and if you have a group of five you each save an additional 20%.
Thanks for reading such a long post... and thanks even more if you are compelled to act and book. We have tried our very best to cater to the C-Boat world and hope to do so for many years to come. This investment in us would really help.
Thanks,
Pura Vida!
Jim, Barbara, Taigan and Team Esprit.
Any further questions you can PM me or email: jim@whitewater.ca or call 613 639 5224
I know the title sounds unbelievable but we have just fallen into an amazing opportunity.
Last week we were filmed for a TV show called The Big Decision. The show connects entrepreneurs with "Angel" investors... and a woman named Arlene Dickenson chose us as a company to consider investing in.
The filming has gone very well and I believe she is engaged and intrigued by Esprit's philosophy of valuing finance, community and ecology as equally important ways of measuring our success.
We applied to be on the show as we have had a challenging year. As many of you know we suspended our Mexico season last year due to security problems. It was a very hard decision for us to do so as Mexico really is our second home... no to mention the loss of our winter revenue. We are however, both an informed and responsible outfitter and made the right decision to suspend our programs to see if the security issue would settled down. Unfortunately, it has not settled down so we will be suspending our programs to Mexico for 2012/2013 as well.
So... as we had people booked... we switched gears and went to Costa Rica instead. Driving to Costa Rica had its challenges (floods, landslides, bribes etc....) all with a mountain of boats, my wife Barbara and our young son Taigan. Regardless, we made it despite the challenges and operated in Costa Rica for 2 months before disaster struck. After a routine service on our van... it burst into flames while the three of us were driving. Barbara grabbed Taigan and ran to safety, I tried to put the flames out to no avail. We lost everything including cameras, computers, wallets, credit cards, 4 Brand new L'Edges and an Ion as well as everything that Taigan owned... all his clothes, car seat, stroller and his "bunny".
Two days later we picked up the Isbells and continued to operate for 5 weeks straight (including filming of Canoe Movie 2) while renting vehicles and great expense.
We flew home to Canada, drove to Mexico, filmed the Big Banana and returned for the Canadian season with our credit maxed out.
Our compelling story landed us an opportunity on the show. So far the filming has gone very well and Arlene "The Dragon" (from a show called Dragon's Den) has given us 5 challenges, they are:
Entrepreneur Arlene Dickenson will consider a $250000 investment in Esprit if I can.
1. Increase repeat and referred bookings by 30%.
2. Get Esprit featured in 4 media outlets.
3. Find a business mentor.
4. Host a large Community Event.
5. Book 20 people for Costa Rica.
The C boat Community can help us with # 1 and #5.
It would be an enormous help to us if supporters could "book a trip to Costa Rica". It requires a $250 deposit which is 100% refundable up to 60 days prior to trip departure. If we get more than 20 reservations before Aug. 6 we complete challenge # 5. If you have travelled with us before... then you are helping us with #1 as well. If you need to cancel... after Aug 6 no problem... if you choose to join us we will give you $100 off the trip cost... and if you have a group of five you each save an additional 20%.
Thanks for reading such a long post... and thanks even more if you are compelled to act and book. We have tried our very best to cater to the C-Boat world and hope to do so for many years to come. This investment in us would really help.
Thanks,
Pura Vida!
Jim, Barbara, Taigan and Team Esprit.
Any further questions you can PM me or email: jim@whitewater.ca or call 613 639 5224