Dragons' Den reject wins project funding
The Beyond Boyle Foundation offers catering training to vulnerable people
An entrepreneur who was turned down by the Dragons' Den investors has been given £60,000 to get his restaurant and hospitality social enterprise off the ground.
Chef Simon Boyle founded the Beyond Boyle Foundation to give homeless people access to catering training to get them back into work, but failed to secure a £250,000 investment when he appeared on the BBC show last September.
But now Mr Boyle has been allocated a £60,000 chunk of the £640,000 Spark Challenge prize fund, which is dished out specifically to social enterprises that tackle homelessness.
The foundation offers an 18-month training programme for vulnerable adults where they learn the workings of the catering industry both front and back of house.
"A huge part of Beyond Boyle is to help others, in specific, those who have experienced homelessness and vulnerable backgrounds," said Mr Boyle.
"They won’t necessarily go into the catering world, but hopefully they will want to start working or learning again and get themselves out of the situation they were originally in."
He added that he will use the funding to employ a chief executive officer to develop the foundation further so that it can help even more vulnerable people back into employment.
After training as a chef and working in several successful restaurants, Mr Boyle set up a private dining business as "a hobby", but later decided to create a social enterprise arm to be more in tune with his own moral compass.
