MacDonald’s business savvy rules in Shark Tank
IN THE penultimate episode of Shark Tank SA, a familiar face to M-Net audiences was able to take her pick when it came to partnering with a Shark to expand her unique swimwear and lingerie brand.
Previous Survivor SA: Champions Shona MacDonald stepped into the tank as a confident businesswoman who was not going to leave without a deal.
MacDonald introduced the Sharks to her company called Thursdays Swimwear and Lingerie, a brand specially aimed at bigger-busted women.
Even though her business is still a fledgling operation, she has spent the last two years on market research and product development, and she impressed the Sharks with her knowledge of the industry.
She was seeking capital from them to roll out the new line for next season’s swimwear and to get the lingerie arm of the company up and running.
Marketing expert Gil Oved was initially not interested in investing, but her tenacity won him over and he made her the first offer of the night.
Hot on Oved’s heels, Dawn Nathan-Jones, who also made MacDonald an offer, pointed out that of all of the Sharks, she could relate the most to this business.
But in the end, it was Silicon Valley-based tech guru Vinny Lingham who won MacDonald over, as he offered to assist her with capital as well as his technological expertise, in order to take “Thursdays” to new heights in the global online retail space.
Three other entrepreneurs were not as convincing, however.
Cape Town-based businessman Tim Clarke scooted into the tank with his tourism business called Cape Side Cars.
Having been operating successfully for many years, Clarke was looking for an investment to scale his business and to market to local clients looking to be driven around the most scenic parts of the Western Cape.
While the Sharks were all very optimistic about Clarke growing a business that can fuel South African tourism, they had their concerns too.
Nathan-Jones, who has spent most of her career in the tourism industry, made an important point to Clarke and the rest of the Sharks: “We all know the up-side of tourism, but there’s a down-side too. It’s highly cyclical, incredibly volatile, and I prefer to invest in asset-light businesses.”
For those reasons, she promptly declared herself out. Romeo Kumalo, Oved and Lingham followed suit, with the general consensus being that Clarke had valued his company too high and that they would not make an easy return on their investment.
Recognising this issue too, accountant Marnus Broodryk offered Clarke a loan in exchange for equity in his business, but Clarke was not convinced and declined to take Broodryk up on this potential compromise.
Following in Clarke’s footsteps was Lebogang Mphela, who is the owner of Malia Nail Care, a high quality, locally produced nail polish formula. She prides herself on providing alluring nail style and on-trend colours, but also on nail care.
Each bottle of Malia Nail Care comes with a sticker on the back giving nail care tips to customers for everyday use at home.
Unfortunately for Mphela her business was just too small and in its infancy for the Sharks to deem it worthy of investing in.
Lastly, an Italian-born innovator hoping to snag a Shark with his fresh take on a frozen food family favourite stepped into the tank.
Frank Ciman, who was hoping for very hungry investors, was pitching a business called Wonderfillz Pizza Cones.
A mechanical engineer, Ciman has designed and manufactures machines that can create coneshaped pizzas that make it much easier to eat than regular pizza slices. While he has been selling this equipment to vendors around SA for the last few years, he was looking for capital from the Sharks to make the product himself and get into retail stores.
Specifically, he required an investment to tool up a bakery that can make the dough and toppings for the pizza cones full-time.
The snag for all five of the Sharks was that he would still be running his manufacturing business on the side, while they were only investing in the retail side of things.
This fact, coupled with the reality that Ciman had no expertise in the highly competitive frozen food retail space, had all of the Sharks swimming away.
As Oved summed it up for Ciman, “You’ve chosen a very tough industry to crack. You’re a great engineer but you’re not a retail expert.”
Shark Tank SA is screened on Sundays between 6pm and 7pm on M-Net 101. — DDR