Friendships and exclusive Slack channels: How Shark Tank Australia contestants stay connected
A growing number of participants are leaving the show with vital connections — not just with celebrity investors, but with each other.
Many startup founders leave the Shark Tank Australia set empty-handed. Others leave with a pledge for future investment.
And a growing number are leaving with vital connections — not just with celebrity investors, but with each other.
Some of those connections are even forming through an exclusive Slack channel, formulated by the Oodie founder and Shark Tank Australia investor Davie Fogarty.
Entrepreneurs from 2024’s blockbuster season describe a community of contestants, including those from previous and international seasons, who are sharing advice away from the cameras.
Strapsicle co-founders Ben Stainlay and Lou Rice earned a provisional investment deal worth $250,000 on Shark Tank Australia, courtesy of investors Davie Fogarty and Robert Herjavec.
Talking via phone from Shenzen, China, where he attended a massive manufacturing trade show, Stainlay said representatives from 2023 Shark Tank Australia alumni Contour Cube and Stryda were also making the trip.
Those entrepreneurs are “friends of ours,” Stainlay said.
“We’re now part of this e-commerce community who come to these expos and conferences… it’s good to be part of a community now,” he continued.
Clutch Glue founder Annabel Hay has secured $1.4 million in pre-seed backing from Blackbird Ventures and Dany Milham after ultimately turning down a televised $400,000 handshake deal on this year’s Shark Tank Australia — again with Shark Tank stars Herjavec and Forgarty.
Speaking to SmartCompany in the days after her episode aired, Hay said connections with former Shark Tank alumni were vital for her pitch, which the Sharks described as one of the best in the show’s history.
Describing mock pitch nights to prepare for the big day, Hay said she recruited a former Shark Tank contestant from overseas to hone her skills.
Practicing with that contestant and “a few other Shark-like people” was “really, really great, to get a first-hand experience from someone able to prepare us,” Hay said.
Other Shark Tank Australia participants are rubbing shoulders online, with investor Davie Fogarty welcoming his chosen startups into his Daily Mentor program.
Operating through the digital chat platform Slack, it allows participants to “lean on the expertise of coaches and other members” and participate in small group sessions.
Its members hail from startups including The Burleigh Wagon, Contour Cube, and Suitor, all of which have appeared on the show.
Paul McLeary, co-founder of DIY hair extension system Muse for Hair, is one of several recent Shark Tank Australia entrepreneurs to be inducted into the Daily Mentor.
Monthly meetings with Fogarty, combined with access to business coaches and its community Slack channels, is “already helping us”, he said, even though the televised investment deal is still in its due diligence phase.
The program has “created a space” for the entrepreneurs “to learn and grow” through what McLeary described as a “crazy learning curve”.
But access to the program and its coaches doesn’t come cheap, with entrepreneurs outside the Shark Tank ecosystem looking at costs of nearly $2500 per month.
In the real world, most Sharks are solitary predators — but in the Shark Tank Australia universe, it appears some of the Sharks and their proteges are swimming together.
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