File image of Margaret Nyamumbo
Margaret Nyamumbo, a Kenyan entrepreneur based in New York, is the talk of the town after securing funds for her coffee business (Kahawa 1893) during the popular TV show Shark Tank.
Nyamumbo presented her idea for Kenyan-made coffee on the American television series, which aired on Friday, February 17.
She was looking for Ksh 44 million ($350,000) in funding for 5% of her company.
“I grew up on my grandfather’s coffee farm in Kenya. We are very proud of the coffee that grows on our soil. Unfortunately, farmers don’t always make enough for the delicious coffee that they produce,” she told the Sharks.
According to Nyamumbo, the lack of adequate compensation for the majority of the coffee farmers inspired her to devise a method of compensating them.
“We source our coffee directly from women farmers in Africa, but that’s not all, we go one step further, our customers can tip the coffee farmers and we match the tips,” she said.
Margaret Nyamumbo
After hearing the entrepreneur’s flawless pitch, the sharks were all eager to invest in his coffee business.
Grede, the first shark, offered Ksh44 million ($350,000) for a 12.5% stake, while Herjavec, the second shark, suggested partnering with Grede for a 12.5% stake. If Nyamumbo accepted this offer, she would have to give up 25% of the business.
The third and fourth sharks offered the entrepreneur a 12.5 percent stake.
After a heated debate, Nyamumbo chose Grede as her investor after she modified her original deal to Ksh44 million ($350,000) for an 8% stake.
Nyamumbo holds a Master’s degree in Finance from Harvard University.
The former World Bank consultant in Kenya, moved to the United States in 2007 for her undergraduate studies.
She left her lucrative Wall Street job working for retail and consumer companies in 2017 to launch Kahawa 1893.
Her company is named after the year that coffee was first planted in Kenya, but to her it is more important to design the future of the coffee supply chain than to honor the past.
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