Baobab
Baobab is an apparel company from New York, NY, that specializes in manufacturing a fashion "icon" that is both stylish and functional: the polo shirt.
The entrepreneurs behind Baobab were inspired to make their own polo shirts because they felt like the ones that they owned always failed after just a couple of washes with the colors turning ashy or the size shrinking on them. To counter these flaws, they created a polo shirt from high end cotton that is resistent to stains from coffee, wine, and ketchup, that won't shrink, and won't fade.
Proving once more that the Patent Office will let people patent pretty much anything, they entrepreneurs claim to have a patent pending collar that won't change shape.
Baobab has also hidden a microfiber cloth on the inside for glasses or sunglasses.
Robert compliments the material claiming that it feels great. The entrepreneurs respond that it's 98% Peruvian cotton. The stain resistence is also apparently a treatment that is applied to the material at some point.
The Baobab polo shirt retails for $98.
To test the market for their product, they pre-sold shirts via a crowdfunding campaign and raised $32,000. Baobab has earned $85,000 in its lifetime with $35,000 earned in the last two months alone. They predict doing $400,000 in sales by the end of the year.
Baobab attracts customers primarily through Instagram and Facebook advertising which means their cost to acquire each customer is $38. When pressed later in the pitch, the entrepreneurs state that they have a 25% repeat rate of customers.
Aparently, "Baobab" is the tree of life in Africa. That's all these bros said. The tree of life in "Africa", forgetting, perhaps that Africa is a continent and not a, you know... people but... okay...
Robert says that since investing in Butter Cloth, they've done $3,500,000 in sales. But, because of his investment, he sees Baobab as a conflict and exits.
Kevin takes issue with the fact that there are "thousands" of companies making polo shirts while Daymond takes issue with how the entrepreneurs have valued the company.
Mark says that the entrepreneurs need to sell the sharks on why their digital marketing is "the best" to differeniate them from other polo shirt manufacturers. This is when the entrepreneurs mention their 25% rate of repeat customers. This doesn't exactly satisfy Mark and Kevin says he just can't see the difference between them and a like manufacturer and, therefore, is out.
Daymond says he likes the product but not the sales and, without more data to consider, he's also out. Lori, likewise, is out after complimenting the entrepreneurs, saying that they're doing everything right but that it's not right for her.
Mark delivers the final blow, stating that he was looking for details that the entrepreneurs just didn't, couldn't, or wouldn't give him and, because of that, he was out leaving Baobab with no more sharks to make a deal with.