Where to, Parker. Issue 5 | Summer 2017

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usiness the man behind the sauce From prison to Dragon’s Den to multi-millionnaire food magnate, Levi Roots is the ultimate rags-toriches businessman. Was it luck that got him there, or shrewd planning? Dominic Bliss finds out. When Levi Roots first came to the UK, aged 11, he could neither read nor write. As a young man he did two stretches in prison, one for assaulting a police officer, the other for a drugs offence. Now aged 58, he owns a £35 million food business, built on the back of his famous Reggae Reggae Sauce. A late developer, you might say. And there’s more to come. Levi is currently in the throes of launching a Caribbean restaurant chain, with plans to open 35 venues around the UK over the next five years, all under the brand of Levi Roots Caribbean Smokehouse. He also records music, has a regular DJ slot on BBC Radio 2 (both reggae, of course), and there’s a new TV show coming in the summer. “I’m quite a busy man,” he says, seated in his maiden restaurant, in east London’s Westfield Stratford City, smiling at his good fortune. Dreadlocks tied back, he’s wearing a navy blue Ozwald Boateng suit (one of three dozen he owns) and enough silver jewellery on his hands to choke a werewolf. None of this would have happened if Levi hadn’t been invited, back in 2007, to appear on Dragons’ Den, the BBC show for budding entrepreneurs. Sporting a black suit, his trademark dreadlocks, and singing to his guitar, he charmed the pants off the dragons, eventually securing a £50,000 investment in his sauce from Peter Jones and Richard Farleigh. (The former is still his business partner while the latter, rather foolishly, allowed himself to be bought out.) Within weeks the product was on the shelves of Sainsbury’s, outselling Heinz Tomato Ketchup after just a year. “Levi Roots? What a great name. Is that your real name?” asked Theo Paphitis, one of the other dragons, after Levi had delivered his pitch. “No, it’s my pseudonym. My real name is Keith,” he replied to all-round mirth. Keith Valentine Graham, to be precise, born in Jamaica in 1958, the youngest of five kids. His parents emigrated to the UK, leaving Keith with his grandparents. Aged 11, he then crossed the Atlantic to join them, moving to the family home in Tulse Hill, in south London. Until then he hadn’t even attended school. “I could only write five letters, to spell my first name,” he remembers. “But I had this sort of photographic memory, I was surprised how quickly I caught up.” That part of south London in the 1970s was rough, to say the least. Levi was a bad boy, often in trouble with the law, and twice detained at Her Majesty’s Leisure. It was during the second stretch (on the Isle of Sheppey) that he met someone who would help turn his life around. Her name was Theresa, a drama teacher from New Zealand, brought in to inspire the convicts. Levi was inspired more than most. “If I met her now I’d probably have to give her half my fortune,” he says, his voice starting to break with emotion. “When I think about her I feel I’m welling up with tears. She was an absolute angel. After I left prison I never saw her again.” 24 where to, parker? Parker_Issue_5_Book.indb 24 29/06/2017 12:25
where to, parker? 25 Parker_Issue_5_Book.indb 25 29/06/2017 12:25
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Page 23: Plumen lightbulb We curse low-energ
Page 27 and 28: I went to all the banks in southwes
Page 29 and 30: sport where to, parker? 29 Parker_I
Page 31 and 32: The promoter of tonight’s show is
Page 33 and 34: performance art Left top: Kipat Kah
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Page 37 and 38: photography The alley cat by Nayan
Page 39 and 40: Left: The moon and the crow by Gide
Page 41 and 42: photography Wild West stand-off by
Page 43 and 44: aby photos where to, parker? 43 Par
Page 45 and 46: feature where to, parker? 45 Parker
Page 47 and 48: lonDon VIllages Left page top: new
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Page 51 and 52: Book online, by app, by phone or by

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