Shark Tank Experience: 1/3
Setting the Context
We had the opportunity to present our company, India Hemp and Co. to investors on India’s first Shark Tank which was aired live on Sony Liv last week.
We want to share some of our experiences with you in the context of everything that went down when we took part in the show.
We’re going to keep this one short, but we’ll be in conversation with the sister co-founders, in this series of blog posts.
Our Context
We started this company bang in the start of the very first pandemic. We didn't know what to expect. We had an idea and a commitment to its development. We worked towards growing a community, educating people about Hemp, building a responsible sustainable brand, exploring various collaborations and business verticals - it never stopped! Our intention is to make an impact and influence people to live more sustainable, conscious and healthier lives.
Here’s what we do:
We have a range of high nutrition products that build immunity, improve gut health, works as an anti-inflammatory for a range of conditions.
The high protein and fibre content also help our bodies repair and build stronger muscles.
They’re natural, vegetarian and vegan friendly. Gluten free. Dairy free.
Now to the point that was highlighted quite a bit, we have 2 vertices for people and their pets!
We are a purpose driven company . We wanted to be more than just a product, a brand and mission people could connect to and join us as we learn, explore and transition to being better versions of ourselves, for ourselves, our loved ones as well as the environment!
(Sidenote: Hemp is one of the most sustainable plants on the planet since it can be used as food, medicine, shelter, clothing and much much more! Read up more our blog posts HERE
Our intention, to lead by example and to keep creating products that are in line with these values and getting our message out there on platforms such as Shark Tank.
Now to the point.
Since we’ve been getting a lot of questions and curiosity around the topic, we’ve put together a quick summary for you. Here’s a quick snapshot of how it went.
How did this all begin?
We’ve always been interested in Shark Tank business ideas. We’d usually watch it, look up the companies and really into the whole dynamic format of the show.
Seeing the companies there was always very inspiring! We always admired their courage and were excited by novel innovations.
Forward to June 2021, Jayanti saw an advertisement of Shark Tank in the Economic Times and jumped right at it! We deliberated whether it was too early for us as well as the show but decided to get into the process and give it our best shot!
Over the course of 5 months, such a massive undertaking required a whole lot of paperwork and preparation.
Tedious 2 sets of 18 page documentation and certifications, pitch decks, pitches, certifications, verifications, registrations, ndas and a whole lot more admin.
With over 65,000+ entries of which 15,000 auditioned and then 198 start-ups were shortlisted.
We were informed in November that we would be one of them!
Our excitement was off the charts, but we didn’t have time to process all the excitement since we had just a week to pack and leave to Mumbai.
This was BIG NEWS! It also had to be a secret until we were aired on the show. We got our team of 10+ involved at this stage.
We needed all hands on deck. As we prepared to dive into the tank with the Sharks.
With a whole lot of help from our team, mentors, and family, we prepared for the on-stage experience, lots of number crunching, pitch preparing (which was originally in English and had to be adapted into Hindi, 2 days before the show). Could you tell?
We were completely out of our comfort zones on all fronts. All this while running the daily business and raising our friends and family round of investment (which we’ll be closing soon).
More on the Bombay/Mumbai on-set experience in our next blog post, we’ll be in conversation with Jayanti.
Stay tuned. Leave us your questions on instagram and we’ll be back with more on this story soon!
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