The idea for Craft Gin Club was born in the summer of 2014.
Jon Hulme, who hails from Stoke-on-Trent, and his friend John Burke had a 'lightbulb moment' as they shared a "few gins" in a London bar.
Seven years later the pair are the helm of a multi-million pound business which ships craft gin to more than 140,000 active subscribers across the 海角视频 every month.
Jon Hulme, who grew up in Burslem, had been working as a software engineer when he eventually decided to take the plunge and launch the business with like-minded John, who he met at a business school in Madrid.
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The 46-year-old said: "The idea for Craft Gin Club started in the summer of 2014. John and I were having drinks in a pub, having a few gins. We were bemoaning, as blokes of a certain age do, and really decided it was time for us to branch out and do our own thing.
"We pulled together three observable trends. The first was the growing consumer interest and appetite for all things gin, which we’ve definitely been proven right on in the years that followed. At the same time, something really interesting was happening on the supply side – lots and lots of small distillers were opening up.
"The third trend we sort of weaved into the model was subscription, people like Birchbox and lately Hello Fresh, really helped to set this idea of subscription and buying on subscription.
"So we weaved all that together and Craft Gin Club was born in January 2015 – and the product today is still pretty true to that idea."
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Every month, Craft Gin Club partners with one small distiller from anywhere in the world who will develop a gin exclusively for its members.
It is then sent out to its network of subscribers in a box containing mixers, garnish, sweet and savoury snacks and the Craft Gin Club magazine.
For its most recent financial year, which closes at the end of the month, Craft Gin Club – which has around 70 employees – is expected to record sales of £35 million.
Jon said: "It's fair to say that we have been successful. We launched in January 2015, were growing quite quickly and then we were approached by the BBC who asked us if we would like to apply for Dragons’ Den.
"We filled in the application form and got through all the rounds and made it through to filming day."
Jon added: "We had a bit of an ace up our sleeve because Sarah Willingham was actually a customer of ours, she was already a member of Craft Gin Club – at that time we only had about two or 3,000 members.
"We went in and did our pitch – and we served all the dragons a really strong gin and tonic, which I think helped – and we got offers from four of the five dragons.
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"Sarah was our choice because she came out and admitted to being a customer of ours, and she was also a fellow Stokie. It felt like it was meant to be...and it's been a rocket ship ever since really."
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Sarah Willingham invested £75,000 in return for a 12.5 per cent stake in the business when they appeared on the show in 2016 – and the Potteries-born businesswoman is still involved in the business today.
In a recent interview with BusinessLive she described Craft Gin club as one of the most successful businesses to ever appear on the show.
Now the company is hoping to continue to build on its success over the next 12 months with plans to grow by 40 per cent. Its focus will be on growing its membership base and developing new products.
And while Jon admits he will "never say never" to the idea of diversifying into supplying other spirits – such as vodka and whisky – he said the next step would be to start exporting his products outside of just the 海角视频.
He said: "Gin is what we're good at and what we specialise in. Gin as a category is still growing in the 海角视频 and even more in overseas territories, so our longer-term vision would be to take great craft gin to the world."