FOR the man determined to make sure the world's travellers have a good night's sleep, you have to wonder when Michael Corrigan takes any rest.

Aged just 31, the entrepreneur now employs 25 people, is active on a global market and is about to sell his one millionth Trtl travel pillow.

Michael, from Glasgow's South Side, has faced plenty of setbacks since he decided in 2011 to build up his own business.

But his energy for success - as well as a few celebrity endorsements - has kept him going.

He said: "I'm quite a restless person and always wanted to do something interesting and creative with my life.

"I'm probably someone who can be a wee bit high maintenance because I have always wanted a wee bit more to do."

Michael studied mechanical engineering and graduated from Strathclyde University in 2009 but, despite taking a corporate job, knew he wanted to set up on his own.

He added: "The job opportunities that were there didn't really chime with what I wanted to do.

"I'm quite romantic about stories and wanted to be someone who, when I got to old age, had all these really interesting stories to share and had clearly lived life to the full.

"Having a business I was passionate about was a good way to do that so I thought, 'I need to start my own business.'"

During fourth year of university, Kwik Fit boss Sir Tom Farmer gave a speech to Michael's engineering class, which left a deep impression on him.

He then became involved in events run by the Scottish Institute of Enterprise and took part in competitions as well as a week long bootcamp in 2010.

Participants needed a product to pitch at the bootcamp.

Michael said: "I had done a lot of travelling over the summer and did a lot of brainstorming with friends.

"We had been travelling by train in Italy to Florence overnight and we arrived after 10 hours of no sleep.

"The long, pretty uncomfortable journey meant you couldn't really enjoy it in the way I wanted to.

"It made us think about travel pillows but there wasn't anything really innovative on the market. We thought, 'Surely we can design something better?'"

From there, the idea of the Trtl travel pillow was developed, a unique design that looks like a scarf but supports the head and neck while wearers sleep.

Michael and his then-business partner set to work.

With Michael's fulltime job in Aberdeen, it meant travelling back to Glasgow every week. He said: "In 2011 I counted up that I'd done 57 journeys on the Megabus."

Thanks to the help of friends and family pitching in, Trtl headed to the Edinburgh Christmas markets in 2012 where they managed to sell 136 travel pillows.

Things started to take off following a chance meeting with Richard Branson at a party in Edinburgh in 2013.

Michael claims the billionaire businessman liked the product and put him in touch with people in the travel industry.

This lead to the fledgling business bosses having a critical decision to make. They had been offered £200,000 investment... but decided to walk away from the deal.

Michael said: "It was an incredibly difficult decision to make and would leave us seriously out of pocket but we calculated that if we didn't pay ourselves any wages then we would have £1000 spare.

"And we walked away from the money.

"It turned out to be the right decision."

Michael describes how taking a chance and following his instinct has played a big part in his success - as well as tenacity and being unafraid of knocking on doors.

Shortly after turning down the money, Michael headed to France for a major industry fair, saying he had only "300 Euro and a bit of hope".

He said: "On the bus from Nice to Cannes, a smart looking guy gets on the bus behind us and says, 'Hello boys' so we spent the next hour harassing him and telling him all about our product.

"We were trying to get him to try it out, saying 'You could do with a rest'.

"At the end of the journey we invited him for a pint and he said yes, but you're buying.

"So we had a drink with him, swapped cards and paid the bill.

"We were so skint we walked from the place we had the drink to our hotel to save on transport.

"At the travel fair no one wanted to speak to us because they were busy dealing with big brands and we started to worry we'd made the wrong call by spending the last of our money on this travel fair.

"But then my phone rang and it was the guy from the bus, Steve, who told me to wear my suit and meet him in front of the Carlton Hotel where he handed over a gold envelope.

"It was proper Willy Wonka stuff.

"There was a big exclusive party and his wife was doing PR for the whole event. We walked in and did all the networking you could possibly do.

"It was amazing."

Since then, Michael has been building up the impressive bank of stories he hoped for.

In 2015 he appeared on Dragon's Den with his former business partner David Kellock where they were offered a £65,000 loan for Trtl by retail entrepreneur Touker Suleyman.

However, they were then told by production staff the offer broke the show's rules and the deal was off the table.

It barely held the business back and before long Trtl was on offer in the celebrity Gift Lounge at the Oscars and at the Grammys, where it was picked up by Jamie Foxx.

The firm manufactures in China as well as the UK, has made deals with Amazon and Argos and employs people in Glasgow and in North America.

They very quickly went from selling three to five travel pillows on the Trtl website to selling more than 1000 in eight hours.

Based on Cadogan Street in the city centre, Michael employs 25 staff in Glasgow and more staff in North America.

He says he is proud to employ seven nationalities and have a staff that is 58 per cent female.

Major retailers are to start selling the Trtl pillow so it will be sold as far afield as Singapore in stores and is available in nearly 70 countries online.

Michael said: "It was a good feeling to walk away from that money and instead grow the business organically. We now don't have any bank funding.

"We're in a good place to grow and do interesting stuff at the moment. That work will bear fruit.

"The whole business is about how if you can rest while you travel you can be awake when you arrive.

"I was privileged enough as a child to have parents who took us on holidays abroad so I have fantastic memories of family holidays.

"My aim is that travellers can rest and be ready to enjoy those experiences as soon as they arrive and that's what we're constantly working on.

"To be honest, it feels a bit unreal. I want to look back when I'm 70 and remember those stories and think, 'I can't believe you did that'."