Dragons’ the fans have praised the ‘best pitch in the history of the show’ after an entrepreneur asked for £100,000 towards his ‘travelling dinosaur business’.

Chris Roberts, known as ‘Ranger Chris’, from Aberdare in South Wales, has had a passion for prehistoric life since he was young and turned his childhood dreams into a reality when he founded Dinomania eight years ago.

The company travels around the UK offering ‘an immersive experience’ to both children and adults, along with gigantic walking dinosaur puppets and a mobile dinosaur museum with both real and replica fossils.

Chris appeared on the show with two people to demonstrate his most impressive primitive costumes, which were so large that the tail repeatedly got stuck in the famous lift up to the den.

But when they entered the room, the dinosaurs were met with audible gasps and ‘wows’ from the Dragons.

While Sara Davies and guest Dragon Joe Wicksappeared to be slightly anxious and caught off guard by the lifelike attire, Peter Jones beamed and was quick to ask whether he could interact with the puppets.

‘The eyes are amazing, they are so good,’ Joe eventually said.

Fans of the show also praised the entertaining pitch, with one writing: ‘The best thing on Dragons Den ever!’

Some fans also quipped that the Dragons reminded them of the animals from the Mesozoic Era, with one writing on X: ‘Never seen so many dinosaurs in one place… and that’s including the Dragons!’

Another penned: ‘Tonight it’s dinosaurs and we’re not just talking about the investor panel.’

A third commented: ‘Dinosaurs on DD, but that’s enough about Deborah and Peter.’

A fourth said: ‘I will always love anything dinosaur related, so I will give him all my money, I don’t even need to know any more.’

Chris appeared on Thursday evening’s show and asked for a £100,000 investment for 15 per cent of his business; however, fans were surprised when he left without a penny.

In his pitch, Chris said that Dinomania’s income is made travelling around the UK to festivals and museums and by putting on a tour for enthusiasts – adding that they have an impressive combined three million followers across YouTube and TikTok.

He told the Dragons that he wanted to set up a ‘base camp’ in Swansea with their investment money, which he described as ‘a fixed location where children and adults can come along and learn about prehistoric life’.

Chris previously had a background in window fitting but said he did not enjoy his job and was instead inspired to start a business after purchasing his first dinosaur puppet after seeing them advertised on YouTube.

Since then, he has slowly been building his business, telling the Dragons that it was turning over £150,000 a year pre-Covid, with a net profit of £7,000.

Recent figures show that Dinomania turned over £270,000 with a net profit of £30,000 – after being their net profit was in the minus figures for two years.

Chris said: ‘I’m a one-man band, I’ve been doing it all on my own for the past eight years, there’s only one of me, I’ve learnt that now. I think we need to make more teams that can go to more festivals.’

He told the potential investors that he believes the base camp could be a success and claimed that even at a 60 per cent capacity, it would turn over 1.2 million.

But the Dragons were not convinced. When Deborah Meaden asked Chris how much the base camp would cost, he claimed it would be £8,000 a month to rent and that the set up costs would range from £80,000 to £100,000.

‘I’ve got to say (that) sounds tiny when you’re looking at a theme park to attract people,’ she said.

However, Chris clarified it would be more of a ‘soft play area’ with the added extra of seeing the lifelike dinosaur puppets roaming around.

The father also revealed that he was currently paying himself a £1,000 monthly salary, adding that he was ‘lucky enough’ to have a ‘fantastic’ wife who is able to financially support him.

He predicted that year one would bring in £300,000 income and said he would then use the profit to open more base camps.

‘I think if we opened one per year for instance, I think we could do five to six different venues in the UK. If we opened three, you’d be looking at £4 million.’

But Peter Jones said: ‘This is a bit of a dinosaur of a business. I mean you’ve spent a long time trying to build a business here and now you’re giving forecasts that I think quite frankly are impossible.

‘The reality is that you have created a really interesting business for you and is not giving you much income, however, it’s probably brought a lot of joy to a lot of young people.

‘For this to have any opportunity of becoming a business at all, it needs to one thing – scale.

‘That’s what I am concerned about, having a venue I don’t think that’s the answer for you.

‘Because for £80,000 you’re going to have a piece of land and a terrapin and that’s not good enough. So I can’t invest because I don’t see there is room for an investor here, so I’m out but thank you for bringing some dinosaurs into the den.’

Sara Davies said that she had ‘déjà vu’ after seeing one of her other businesses attempted the business model that Chris proposed.

‘The reality is that if you don’t hit that £1.2 million and you only hit £1 million, that £200,000 is straight off your bottom line because you’ve got your fixed overheads,’ she said.

‘It can so quickly become what looks so great on the paper, (but) the reality is starkly different.’

Deborah advised him to maximise on his ability to be ‘agile’ adding that he should make the most of what he is business is currently offering customers.

Joe – who was the fifth and final Dragon to bow out – urged Chris to focus on making longer form YouTube content to engage his followers.

He said: ‘If I was you in your position with your passion and all of these amazing dinosaurs you have, I would try and focus on long form YouTube content because if you work hard, before you know it, you could be earning (up to) £5,000 a month. You don’t need millions of views to have a really good channel.’

The father-of-four added that he would be tuning into Chris’ content with his children while wishing him ‘the best of luck’.

When he came out of the den, Chris said: ‘Of course I am a little bit disappointed but I think that they really did love the dinosaurs and they loved me as well which is the ultimate aim.

‘We’re going to do a show tomorrow which is going to be amazing and it has inspired me to push myself a little bit harder and maybe prove them wrong. I love my business and it’s going to continue with or without the dragons.’