ITV Monkey funds TV shopping start-up

Start-up TV shopping venture Carefree.tv raised cash to fund its first steps by auctioning off several of ITV Digital's infamous Monkeys on eBay.

All three of Carefree.tv's founders previously worked for now defunct terrestrial digital broadcaster ITV Digital and one of them auctioned off as many Monkeys as she could salvage to raise cash.

Karen Kraws, director of operations and finance at Carefree.tv, said: "On the last day at ITV Digital everyone was throwing Monkeys around the office and whoever caught the most could just walk out with them. I caught three and sold them for £50 each on eBay, although the week before they were going for £250.

"The money definitely went towards funding Carefree.tv."

Carefree.tv is searching for seed funding of around £300,000 right now on website Angel Bourse to launch its venture which will sell electronic goods to low income households.

Carefree.tv's three founders met while working at ITV Digital where they came up with a business plan to sell affordable products to UK households with a yearly income of less than £20,000, using personalised payment methods.

While at the company the three pitched their sales and payment plan to executives but were ignored and so Carefree.tv was born.

The administrators for ITV Digital, Deloitte & Touche, said Monkey cannot be used for commercial purposes until the dead business' finances are sorted out.

There are 32,000 Monkeys - worth £1.6m at Kraws' valuation - relaxing in a warehouse in a top secret UK location.