A GEE Cross man’s gamble to go into the world of board games has paid off after winning an award from TV Dragon Theo Paphitis.
And Alex Hamilton’s winter-themed idea, The North Pole Race, is definitely not on a slippery slope as talks over it being mass produced and marketed are ongoing.
Not bad for an idea born in his home and produced in just 15 minutes and financed by himself to the tune of about £25,000.
Alex, who runs a camper van hire company and owns an office block in Hyde, said: “It was a Sunday night in November 2019. My wife was watching TV and I’m always thinking of things. I own quite a few businesses and I love Christmas and I love board games.
“I’ve been in the motor trade for 30 years and own an office block. I also own a camper van hire business. I’ve got an idea and the money, I’ll give it a go.
“Within 10 minutes, I’d got an A4 pad out and written everything down. I’d done all the sketching for the board and the box – it literally took 10 or 15 minutes.
“So I set out on finding a freelance artist. I found one and within a month of coming up with the idea, I had everything you now see on the game.”
Had things been slightly different – had Covid-19 not happened – it is likely The North Pole Race would have been on the streets earlier.
But after a rocky start, things are looking good, with Paphitis’ replacement on Dragon’s Den, Piers Linney, showing interest.
Alex added: “I got in touch with China and someone who could make it, then the inevitable happened in March 2020. That basically set us all back.
“That guy disappeared and other people took over but they put the price up, so I said, ‘Not a chance,’ and I said, ‘Let’s switch it all to the UK or Europe.’
“I got in touch with the company that makes Monopoly and Uno and after a six or seven month conversation, we agreed a price and everything was manufactured in Waterford, Ireland.
“Then in mid to late Summer last year, the first 1,500 arrived. They’re now in stock and we sold about 200 leading up to Christmas through online.
“Then we started entering things ran by business leaders like Theo Paphitis and we won the Small Business Awards.
“In the meantime, though, I’ve been contacting everyone and sent a few out. Piers Linney actually contacted me and asked for a second copy.
“Another company, a big distributor, also got in touch asking if they could do a three-pronged approach, starting with independent shops, then into your high street, then into your real big boys, like Argos, Tesco or Morrisons.
“That’s a three-year plan but if that comes off, they won’t be ordering 1,500 copies, they’ll be ordering tens of thousands at a time!
“I won’t pat myself on the back until it’s a success but the foundations have been laid.”
Alex, 52, insists he is not getting ahead of himself with the board game, in which players must travel through the seasons to get to the North Pole.
You roll dice to decide how far you move along and whether you get a hard or an easy question and at the end, you have 20 seconds to answer one of the final round questions.
Get it wrong and you return to the start of the Winter Season.
However, the reaction from pals and family members – even people in his local pub – has convinced him it could go big.
He said: “It can sound arrogant but I don’t mean it to, I like to win where I can and at the same time, proper planning prevents poor performance.
“I like to make sure everything is all lined up but the feedback is phenomenal from customers who’ve bought it.
“From my friends, we had a couple saying, ‘Alex, we started laying this at 11am, it’s now 4pm!’
One guy bought it for 20 of his family and he saw 19 people just laughing, he said, ‘My pal’s done this.’
“And the public reaction means more than anything. One guy who comes in the local pub, who takes the mickey out of people, won one and after Christmas he came up and said, ‘Alex, that’s brilliant.’
“He’d tell me if it was garbage. I’ve played it and lost, I created the bloomin’ thing!”