Is Krisi Smith, our Head Tea Mixologist, the new Alan Sugar? Would you have invested in any of the candidates? How about a slice of Gingerbread Chai cake?
Ready Set StartUP is Amazon Prime Video’s new answer to The Apprentice - with twists, turns & mishaps abound! (Talk to Keith, I mean Mike! Make sure you do your research before presenting to founders, people!) 10 contestants go head to head with the chance to win an £100,000 investment, as well as expert business advice from industry experts.
Bird & Blend were picked to feature in episode 4 ‘Tea-riffic Tensions’, & gave the contestants the challenge to showcase our magical world of tea in new & exciting ways, at exclusive events held the very next day!
With Co-Founder Krisi starring as a guest judge, along with some familiar B&B faces making some cameos, the episode is packed full of tea goodness.
We think you’ll all agree, it’s a pretty intense episode! We were on the edge of our seats watching, thank goodness we had a cuppa to see us through!
Now, you may be wondering ‘wow I wonder what filming that was like’, have we got the answer for you! Read below to find out!
‘I was super excited when we were approached by Amazon to do the show. The production company actually contacted me after hearing the Bird & Blend story, which was very flattering. It seemed like a fantastic opportunity to show off all things Bird & Blend & hopefully introduce a whole new group of people to our magical world of tea.
Supporting start ups & small businesses is something that we have been passionate about from day 1, and it seemed like a great fit from that aspect too.
Then came deciding what we would want them to promote. Bringing new tea innovation to the market is a huge part of what we do, so we settled on bottled tea concentrates. This is an idea we've toyed with launching over the years. Homemade tea concentrates are great for cocktails, lattes, baking - you name it, so we were interested to see where the contestants would take it.
So, we had a concept, a product & a location (our fabulous tea shops in Borough Market & Portobello Road), time to film.
Meeting the contestants and filming the briefing was exciting, they all enjoyed the tea, and I was really able to convey our eco ethos, as well as our love of supporting charities too.
It was exciting to see how passionate some of the contestants were (even if that passion was a little misguided, neat tea concentrate doesn’t go down easy!) and the tea experiences they put on showed a lot of different sides to the tea.
When it came to the pitches, tensions were running high between team Bird and team Blend! It was thrilling to be a judge and give feedback for the events that they ran for us. I felt for the contestants, some of them were so early in their journey and it reminded me of the early Bird & Blend days. It was hard to decide whether to be a nice judge or a harsh judge, but I think I managed to get somewhere in the middle.
It was an eye opening experience to see what goes down when filming a TV show, and also a great opportunity to spread our magical world of tea to the TV screen.’
You can watch Ready Set StartUP on Amazon Prime Video now, we hope you enjoy it! Here’s a sneak peek to whet your appetite!
