Ayrshire cows showed up on a recent edition of CBC’s Dragon’s Den, but they didn’t leave the March 5 show with any cash.
However, Shari van de Pol wasn’t disappointed that the dragon investors didn’t buy into her Ontario-based Cattleytics company, which provides dairy farmers with software that helps them analyze data and manage their farms.
Van de Pol, the founder and CEO of the company, said at a watch party Cattleytics hosted in Dundas with staff, family and dairy farmers, that she wasn’t all that concerned that none of the dragons wanted to invest in her company.
They were more in it for the publicity, she says. The episode took a complex conversation about dairy data and put it in front of a national television audience.
“What we wanted is, we wanted a positive experience to show people, to showcase farms, to showcase our business, to showcase agri tech,” she said.
It took a team to get the cows to the 10th story of the CBC building where the Dragon’s Den stage is located.
Mac and Rose Jakeman took two of their Ayrshires to downtown Toronto. Mac says that the trailer was lifted up to the 10th floor by an elevator.
After a wait, it was onto the stage for van de Pol, in front of a special 20th anniversary crew of dragons who all received investments on past shows and used those funds to help create successful businesses. They included Tara Bosch, Marc LaFleur, Barb Stegemann, Jay Klein and Joanna Griffiths.
The recording took about 45 minutes, but only a few minutes ended up on the show. Cattleytics staff didn’t know what would end up broadcast until they saw it.
Van de Pol was looking for a $1.2 million investment in the company.
The dragons understood the value, and congratulated van de Pol on being able to build the company she has without outside investors. They were impressed by the amount of government funding she was able to find.
“Doing that as a solo founder is nothing short of amazing,” said Bosch.
However, when it came to the moment of truth, they quibbled over future growth that wasn’t yet known, compared to the value of the requested potential investment, and all of them were out.
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