Amble students meet Dragons' Den star Peter Jones at national awards

The group, who refer to themselves as ‘Lights, Clouds & Co’, secured second place in the nationwide Tycoon Enterprise Competition.

They came up with the idea of selling self-sufficient plants. They designed and crafted terrariums for the plants, this allows them to thrive for over a month without being watered.

The Peter Jones Foundation organises the Tycoon competition and encourages young people to think about business.

Those who apply write a business plan, which if approved are loaned money to start a business and compete with other student companies.

The group were successful with their idea and used the loan to set up shop. They worked extremely hard, selling their plants at the Amble Harbour car boot sale every weekend.

They also set up stalls at school events.

Their hard work paid off when, in July, they made it to the final 12 out of 300 businesses. The finals were held in Hampton Court Palace, London.

They headed south by train, leaving Amble at 4am, accompanied by Mr Gaines and Mr O’Neil.

The palace gardens were set up into stalls where the final businesses sold their ideas to judges and Peter Jones himself.

James Calvert Spence College were awarded national runners-up – winning the award for both KS3 and KS4.

Becky, from Lights, Clouds & Co, said: “We were so nervous but really excited. I think we won because a lot of the judges found our idea unique and interesting. They had said they’d never seen anything like it before.”