MEET ANDY WILSON

ANDY WILSON: (Voiceover) There we go with a big splash.

HATTIE: When Andy Wilson was broke from investing every penny he had into his Boston Duck Tour launch, he was still a million dollars short, so he went looking for venture funding.

ANDY: I was desperate, you know, and I tried to get bank financing, and I tried to go to the SBA, you know, all that stuff--was gone. So in last desperation, I made phone calls. So I finally got a hold of this woman and--through a partner at an accounting firm, because I called him desperately.

I said, `You've got to help me find--.' He says, `Her name is Carrie McIndoe.' And he says,` Her name's all about what she is, Carrie 'Mac Can Do.''

I called my mom up, and I said--because I was broke--I said, `I need to borrow some money to fly some people out so I can get to the last step,' and that was in June, and by August, they had raised the money for me, $1 1/4 million.

And, you know, they had the contacts, I had the offering memorandum...

HATTIE: So explain to me an offering memorandum. What is it?

ANDY: An offering memorandum is a legal document that explains your business idea, how you're gonna execute it, your financial projections, the legal structure and it does it in such a way--and it also discloses all the risks. In other words, there are inherent risks in any business, you know.

I feel like a farmer. One of the risks was the weather. If it rained for an entire season, I'd go bankrupt, you know. So I had the logo on the front of my offering memorandum. You know, it's a big, thick book.

HATTIE: The little duck?

ANDY: And when I first showed her this, I showed her a picture of the skyline views from the Charles, and she says, `Andy, you're all wrong. It's not the logo.' And she put the picture of the views right here of Boston on the front of the thing.

And I was just telling you about these investors in Maryland.

I'd been going around because I'd never met half these people. And I said, `Why did you invest?' And they said, `We liked the idea, and we saw that picture on the front of the offering memorandum, and we were sold.'

He said, `We knew it would work.'