Product Update

Is Mainstage Travel Still in Business? (2026 Update)

Is Mainstage Travel from Dragons’ Den still around in 2026? The deal it made, the dragons who invested, and where to buy Mainstage Travel today.

Dragons' Den IndexUpdated 17 January 20266 min read

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Mainstage Travel pitched a package holiday tour operator built around low-cost clubbing holidays for the 18 to 24 market, a category the Den does not see very often. Over a decade later, the business is not just surviving, it has grown into a genuinely large operator. The short answer is yes, and the growth story here is one of the better ones in the show's history.

The short answer

Mainstage Travel is still in business, now operating under the expanded name Mainstage Festivals, running a portfolio of overseas music and festival holidays. The company has a live, active website and continues to run trips today, including into ski resorts, beach destinations, and dedicated dance music festivals across Europe.

This is one of the clearer post-Den growth stories among UK pitches. A business that started as a single youth-holiday concept has expanded into multiple branded festival products under one company.

The pitch in the Den

Mainstage Travel appeared in Series 11, Episode 7, in the tech and software category, pitching a tour operator built around affordable clubbing and party holidays aimed squarely at the 18 to 24 market, founded by Rob Tominey and Aden Levin in 2011.

The founders asked for 100,000 pounds in exchange for 15 percent of the company, a relatively modest equity give-up that reflected a business already generating real bookings and revenue in a well-defined niche rather than an unproven idea.

The deal that got done

Piers Linney backed the business solo, putting up the full 100,000 pounds asked for the full 15 percent on the table, a strong outcome for the founders since it meant no extra equity had to change hands to secure the investment.

Linney's background in technology and operations complemented a travel business that needed to scale its booking systems and logistics quickly to keep up with demand from a young, price-sensitive customer base.

What happened after the show

The business expanded significantly in the years after its Dragons' Den appearance, reportedly generating millions in profit by the early 2020s. It broadened out from single clubbing holidays into a wider festival portfolio under the Mainstage Festivals name, including Snowboxx, a ski and music festival in the French Alps, and Kala, Albania's first international music festival, alongside several other branded events run in partnership with established music promoters.

That expansion from one holiday product into a multi-brand festival company is a significant scaling story, and Piers Linney is understood to have remained a shareholder well beyond the initial investment period, a sign of sustained confidence in the direction the business took.

Where things stand now

Here is the recap. Mainstage Travel pitched in Series 11, asked for 100,000 pounds for 15 percent, and got exactly that from Piers Linney.

Today the company trades as Mainstage Festivals, running a genuinely broad portfolio of overseas festival and holiday events, with an active website taking bookings now. If you came here wondering whether Mainstage Travel made it, it did, and it has grown well beyond the single clubbing-holiday concept it pitched with.

Why this one scaled so well

Youth travel is a category with real seasonal demand and a customer base that is highly receptive to social proof and word of mouth, which makes it a good fit for building a brand quickly once the initial product-market fit is proven. Mainstage Travel had that fit from the start, an affordable, well-organised clubbing holiday for a specific age group, and used the funding and credibility from the Dragons' Den deal to build out infrastructure fast.

Diversifying from one holiday type into a portfolio of festival brands, each targeting a slightly different niche within dance and youth culture, is also a smart way to reduce reliance on any single event or destination staying popular. That is a large part of why the company built after the pitch looks considerably bigger and more durable than the one that walked into the Den.

Where to buy Mainstage Travel

Still selling as of 17 January 2026. Check today's price and availability.

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See the full Mainstage Travel deal breakdown and term sheet →