Mahantam Glass Washer has achieved something that rarely happens in Shark Tank India. They managed to accomplish an all-shark deal.
What’s more surprising is that they are only at the pre-seed stage, and still achieved this uncommon feat.
Let us check out what is about them that convinced all the sharks to believe in them and bring them on the same page.
Mahantam Glass Washer Founders
Mahantam is founded by two brothers named Dhaval and Jayesh Nai.
One of the philosophies of their life is that rather than ignoring their problems, they would try to find solutions.
Jayesh was interested in doing business since childhood. Dhaval has a diploma in engineering. During his engineering, he would often drink tea from the tea stall outside his college. These small tea stalls do not follow a hygienic washing process.
Once to the horror of Dhaval, he saw that a goat was drinking water from the same container in which the tea stall owner would wash the tea glasses. When he brought this up to the tea seller, he just dismissed it. The next day onwards he stopped drinking tea from that stall.
Just before the first lockdown, his father had given him a laptop. He would surf through youtube videos to learn to make designs. It took him six months to learn it.
Once he went with his father to a hardware store, where his father had given the order to make a bed. He asked his father to talk to the shopkeeper to let him work with them. His father approached the shopkeeper and requested he let his son work with them.
Dhaval further convinced the shopkeeper by telling him that he wants to help them, do whatever work they want him to do and he does not want any money in return.
The shopkeeper agreed. Dhaval started his work, then after a few days, he persuaded the shopkeeper to let him use the junk and the waste materials produced in the shop.
Every day he would get two hours off, during which he would work on making his glass washer machine.
Mahantam Glass Washer Machine
The first prototype took 6 months and it failed
The second prototype also failed, but he was able to build the mechanism that he wanted.
The third prototype also failed.
The fourth one also failed.
Finally, the shopkeeper told him that he is not only wasting his time but also the time of his other karigars (workers)
Instead of giving up, Dhaval went to his mentor and explained his financial problems. His mentor told him not to worry and gave him ₹10,000. He resumed working on his machine again. It took him one more month to build it successfully.
This machine hygienically washes 15 glasses in 30 seconds.
One of his friends who was a YouTuber suggested making a video of his machine. One mechanical engineer from Surat, who has a tea business, saw this video and ordered his machine.
Motivated by this he went to various colleges and presented his pitch and collected ₹1 lakh. With this, he made 5 machines.
Now, he wanted help with sales and this is when his brother joined him.
Mahantam Glass Washer Machine Shark Tank India
Peyush had doubts about the product market fit and pointed out that most of the tea stall owners might not have electricity, so how will they operate this machine?
To this Dhaval replied that his target customers are tea shop owners who like to maintain hygiene, save time, and also show off. These tea shops use electricity.
They explained that their machine washes 10,000 glasses with only ₹9 electricity. Their machine is a better option than using disposable cups because for every ₹800 to ₹10,000 glasses that they sell, they have to spend ₹6K on purchasing glasses. If they use Mahantam Glass Washer they would recover that cost in approx 5 months.
Also, if they keep labor to wash the glass, they will have to pay them the minimum wage of ₹200 rupees every day.
Their Gross margin is 32%.
Their aim is to sell 50 machines in the year (2022-2023).
They wanted the investment from sharks to set up their manufacturing unit and R & D.
Deal or No-Deal
The founders had asked for ₹30 lakhs for 10% equity.
Anupam offered ₹30 lakhs for 10% equity.
Other sharks also loved the determination and passion of the founders that they joined Anupam in his offer.
The founders of Mahantam Glass Washer accepted it and the deal was secured.
Concluding Remarks
At the end of the pitch, Anupam predicted that such entrepreneurs are an inspiration to the village kids, and looking at them many kids will say that even they want to make a big business. We couldn’t agree more with him.
I would like to conclude by presenting some amazing entrepreneurial qualities of Dhaval:
- Relentless Fighter
He did not give up even after his 4 prototypes failed and the hardware store owner where he worked asked him not to waste his time.
- Grab opportunities with both hands
When he went to a hardware shop, he saw an opportunity to learn and build his machine, so he convinced the store owner to let him work for him.
- Ask for Help
He truly believes that it does not matter if you don’t have any money or guidance, in order to be successful you need to keep on moving ahead, There are many people to help you with guidance and money, you just need to ask.
- Focus on the Solution
He believes that rather than using your energies to ignore your problems, should use your energies to focus on solutions.
5. Leverage the Power of Social Media
He did not know about sales, so he uploaded a YouTube video of his glass washer machine. This got him his first customer.
Stories like this have the power to change the future of India. We hope to see more and more entrepreneurs like Dhaval emerging from all corners of the country, that is when we can say with conviction that the country is truly progressing.
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