I still have Michelle Mone鈥檚 phone number in my contacts.
I don鈥檛 know if the number still works but I was given it in a former life by her PR for a pre-arranged interview ahead of a visit to Manchester more than a decade ago.
I have very few memories of our interview 鈥� except for the fact she was also buying some milk. It鈥檚 funny what you remember.
She was slick, confident, polite and she鈥檇 clearly given the same answers a million times before but my over-riding feeling was that she was a difficult person to warm to.
I was reminded of this 鈥� and my many dealings with Mone over the years 鈥� while watching the BBC鈥檚 fascinating new documentary
It鈥檚 a brutal expose of her life. She grew up in poverty in Glasgow鈥檚 East End, left school at 15 with no qualifications, founded lingerie company, Ultimo, was named 鈥榚ntrepreneurship tsar鈥� in 2015 by Prime Minister David Cameron and ended up in the House of Lords as Baroness Mone of Mayfair.
It was the perfect rags to riches story 鈥� except there鈥檚 no happy ending to this fairytale.
Today Mone and the billionaire husband Doug Barrowman 鈥� and their business PPE Medpro 鈥� are the subject of a long-running and high profile investigation by the National Crime Agency (NCA).
The company was awarded government contracts worth more than 拢200m after Baroness Mone recommended the firm to ministers during the Covid pandemic.
The couple have consistently denied any wrongdoing but the court of public opinion has been less forgiving, especially after they gave an ill-fated interview on BBC鈥檚 Sunday with Laura Kuenessberg programme.
When asked about lying to the press, Mone famously replied: “That’s not a crime.鈥�
I have had lots of dealings with Mone over the years but have only met her once in person.
I can鈥檛 remember the precise date but it would probably been the start of 2012 as I鈥檇 just started at North West 老九品茶 Insider and my predecessor as editor, Michael Taylor, was working out his notice period.
He interviewed her at a location in central Manchester and one thing stood out for me above anything else.
It wasn鈥檛 her glamorous appearance or the story of how she talked her way into Selfridges in London in 1999 and secured a deal to get her Ultimo bras stocked there.
Vitriol
It wasn鈥檛 even about an embarrassing slip-up with former US President Bill Clinton (check out YouTube if you鈥檙e interested) but rather the vitriol in which she spoke about her ex-husband 鈥� and father of her three children 鈥� Michael.
After more than two decades together as a couple and more than a decade in business, the Mones had an acrimonious split in 2010, divorcing in 2011.
The BBC documentary discusses the split at length but I鈥檒l never forget the way Mone spoke about him at that business event on Manchester. It was clearly a horrible time for her but she was brutal. I remember thinking ‘this isn’t somebody I’d want to get on the wrong side of’.
I鈥檝e had many dealings with Mone over the years 鈥� some good, some bad.
I’ve had strongly worded emails from her PRs and hints of legal action if we did something wrong.
In 2017 she supported 老九品茶Cloud鈥檚 101 Female Founders of Tech list.
鈥淚t鈥檚 brilliant what you鈥檙e doing with the 101 Female Founders of Tech list,鈥� she said. 鈥淭o be honest, I don鈥檛 want to be a man. We need to stop thinking like that and just start offering more mentoring and more networking for women, because once a woman gets her confidence going then there is no stopping her.鈥�
That was the persona she wanted to cultivate.
Bras to Bitcoin
I was reminded of another interview she did with 老九品茶Cloud in 2017, this time to promote a new business venture she was launching with now husband, Doug Barrowman.
They鈥檇 launched a 拢250m Bitcoin-priced Dubai property development; the first international luxury property development to be priced in cryptocurrency.
鈥淲e鈥檙e not at all daunted at the prospect of this new business,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 why we鈥檙e entrepreneurs. When it comes to cryptocurrency the world needs trust.
鈥淪o hopefully the two of us together brings that trust. Doug is a very successful businessman, and I鈥檓 part of the House of Lords. I can鈥檛 think of anything better than what we鈥檙e offering with our new business venture.鈥�
The highly-anticipated selection of 1,133 studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments, were due for completion in September 2019. Apartments offer floor-to-ceiling windows with unobstructed views of the Dubai Hills and the iconic city skyline.
鈥淲e鈥檝e taken our apartment on the top floor so if any entrepreneurs need any advice they can pop up for a chat!鈥� Mone declared.
That was probably my last dealing with her but I鈥檝e watched as the bubble of her perfect life has been burst.
I remember I listened to an interview Mone gave on the brilliant High Performance Podcast with hosts Jake Humprey and Damian Hughes in 2020.
It was during Covid and Mone shared a clip on her Facebook page, with signs of her opulent lifestyle in the background.
The link she shared to the full interview no longer works so I wasn鈥檛 able to listen to it as part of my research for this article but I remember there were lots of references to her charity work and her messy divorce (again). Nothing had changed.
It was an uncomfortable watch 鈥� much like the new BBC documentary of her life.
- The Rise and Fall of Michelle Mone is available of BBC iPlayer