Dragons’ Den star Steven Bartlett was a millionaire by 23 and a TV regular by 28, but he claims his greatest achievement is his girlfriend.
The businessman is besotted by a French well-being influencer and businesswoman who has her own enormous social media following.
Here’s everything you need to know about Steven Bartlett, his career, and his relationship with his girlfriend.
Who is Steven Bartlett from Dragons’ Den and Diary of a CEO?
Steven Bartlett is a hugely successful businessman and Dragon on BBC One‘s Dragons’ Den.
He dropped out of university to start his first business, and by 23 he was a millionaire. He went on to create the Diary of a CEO podcast, which is one of the UK’s most popular podcasts.
Steven has also published 2021 Sunday Times bestseller ‘Happy Sexy Millionaire: Unexpected Truths about Fulfilment, Love and Success’.
By 28 years old, Steven Bartlett became Dragons’ Den’s youngest ever Dragon.
Where did Steven Bartlett grow up?
Steven was born in Botswana on August 26, 1992 to an English father and a Nigerian mother. The family moved to Plymouth, England, when Steven was 2 years old.
Steven attended Plymstock School, before studying Business Management at Manchester Metropolitan University. Famously, he dropped out of the university after just one lecture.
Speaking to the Guardian, Steven said he looked around a room full of his hungover classmates and realised “this wasn’t going to take me to where I needed to go”.
Instead, he pursued entrepreneurship, and the rest is history.
What was Steven Bartlett’s first business?
While he organised school trips and vending machines at school, Steven’s first ever real business was called Wallpark.
Wallpark was envisioned as a social media network for students in the same area to connect for mutual benefit. He describes it as a “Gumtree for students”.
While Wallpark didn’t make it big, it did offer a steep learning curve for Steven – and led him to connections that would prove fruitful building his future business empire.
How did Steven Bartlett make his money? What’s Steven Bartlett’s business?
While working on Wallpark, Steven connected with student content creator Dominic McGregor. He convinced Dominic to abandon his studies as well, and together the pair set up The Social Chain.
The Social Chain was a social media marketing platform, perfectly up-to-date with the growing social media trends of 2014. The Social Chain grew rapidly. By 2023, Steven was a millionaire. By 2022, The Social Chain was valued at £474 million.
In 2017, Steven set up the Diary of a CEO podcast. By 2022, Diary of a CEO’s monthly downloads exceeded 10 million. In 2023, it was the UK’s second most downloaded podcast. Diary of a CEO saw Steven interview a diverse range of guests from Liam Payne to Matt Hancock. Steven’s estimated annual income from the podcast is about £1 million a year.
Steven founded private equity company Catena Capital in 2020, though he retired as a director in 2023. He also joined the board of directors of meal-replacement company Huel.
He joined Dragons’ Den in 2021, and by 2023 sold his remaining stake in The Social Chain for £7.7 million.
His current projects are marketing and communications agency Flight Story and Web3 software application creator Thirdweb. He co-founded Flight Story in 2021 with Oliver Yonchev, and co-founded Thirdweb in 2022. He also launched Flight Story Fund, a multi-million pound fund for tech startups, in 2023.
What has Steven Bartlett invested in?
Lots! His big-name investments are the aforementioned Huel, and personalised nutrition programme Zoe.
He’s also previously invested in The Healing Company, atai Life Sciences, R. Agency, Alto Neuroscience and AbCellera.
On Dragons’ Den, major investments include laboratory-grown diamonds business Kimaï in 2024. At £250k investment marks Steven’s highest ever spend on the show. He has also invested in artisan cheese maker cheesegeek, dog toilet brand Piddle Patch, digital charity app Toucan and chocolatiers Russell & Atwell.
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Does Steven Bartlett have a girlfriend? Does he have children?
Steven is not currently married, although he does have a girlfriend. He is currently dating French influencer Melanie Vaz Lopez. The pair met in 2016 over Instagram and dated for a year before splitting in 2017.
They reunited in 2022 after Steven flew to Bali, where Melanie lives, to win her back. The pair have reportedly been together ever since.
Steven told The Sun: “Getting myself into a loving relationship with a wonderful woman has totally been my greatest achievement.”
He said he had previously avoided relationships, after witnessing his parents’ toxic relationship as a youngster.
However, he said: “After doing a lot of work, I eventually found someone that I fell in love with and I’ve been mature enough to keep that relationship strong and grow with it.”
Melanie is the founder of Bali Breathwork Studio. She is also a reiki master and posts wellbeing tips to her 134k followers on Instagram.
She has also written a raw vegan recipe book, as well as a fitness and nutrition guide called Booty Academy.
Steven and Melanie do not currently have children, although Steven told the Metro in 2022 he would like to get married and have kids.
Is Steven Bartlett a billionaire? How rich is Steven Bartlett?
While Steven Bartlett’s not quite a billionaire (at the time of writing), he is pretty rich!
Forbes valued Steven at £71 million when he was 26 years old. He was also listed in their 30 Under 30 list in 2020. Steven is now 31 with no signs of slowing down yet.
Read more: Dragons’ Den: The Dragons’ net worths and how much they’re paid for the BBC series
Dragons’ Den continues on Thursdays at 8pm on BBC One.
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