Ariro
Initial Ask – Rs.50 lacs for 2.5% equity at a valuation of Rs.20 Cr.
About the Company
With a vision to become a household brand, this company manufactures montessori toys for 0-3 years children using Neemwood, making it antibacterial and antifungal. Designed about a 100 products till now, they offer a range of safe and purposeful toys starting from a price of Rs. 250 upto Rs. 23000. With a unique selling proposition of simple, handmade and eco-friendly value system, the life of these toys is claimed to be 8 months to 6 years.
They operate through their website mostly, from where they are grabbing 80% of their sales. The other 20% of their sales come from platforms like Amazon. Not only this, they are tied offline with Hamleys, having around 43 stores in the country. They have been approaching people and building their community by content marketing through Instagram.
Past performance of the Company
Currently, they are working at a monthly sales of Rs. 25-30 lacs. Pointed out very rightly by one of the sharks, it is a high margin business, where this company earns 50-60% gross margins (9% monthly).
Industry Overview
The sector is evolving on the tracks of durability and sustainability. It is a fact that a child consumes plastic equal to that in a credit card. Thus, environmental conerns as well as child health issues has played a role for viable future of wooden montessori toys. Montessori toys have an edge because of its nature; high priced toys can also be sold with good marketing, thus ensuring high profits in this sector. Platforms like FirstCry are the target marketplaces for these companies.
Offers made, and the one accepted:
1. Ashneer Grover started off with the offers: offering 50 lacs for 15% equity of the company.
2. This rich offer was followed by Peyush Bansal and Aman Gupta offering the same amount at 15% equity.
3. Anupam Mittal too came in by offering the same amount at 12% equity.
4. After Ashneer revised his offer to grab 11% equity, Anupam revised it to 10% equity.
5. Ashneer and Anupam joined hands too for giving them same amount of funds at 10%.
This was countered by asking for the same amount of funds from Aman and Peyush at 10% equity of the company, and the deal was closed at it.