Pitch Deck Teardown: Plantee Improvements’ $1.4M seed deck

It’s uncommon that I come throughout a pitch deck that ticks nearly all of the packing containers. It’s so good, in actual fact, that I fed Plantee’s deck into an AI tool I built, and it decided there was a 97.7% probability that Plantee would increase cash. This device typically determines that solely about 7.5% of all pitch decks are as much as scratch, so Plantee’s is positively off the charts.

What the robots didn’t choose up, nevertheless, was that Plantee’s Kickstarter marketing campaign was canceled earlier than it was accomplished, and there are a number of different complicated bits as properly. Let’s dive in to see what works, and what may very well be improved.

We’re on the lookout for extra distinctive pitch decks to tear down, so if you wish to submit your individual, here’s how you can do that. 

Slides on this deck

1. Cowl slide
2. Abstract slide
3. Group slide
4. Advisers and buyers slide
5. Mission slide
6. Market validation slide
7. Drawback slide
8. Answer slide
9. Product slide
10.  Aggressive panorama slide
11.  Traction slide
12.  Goal buyer slide
13.  Market dimension slide
14.  GTM slide
15.  Pricing & unit economics slide
16.  Imaginative and prescient slide
17.  Ask and Use of Funds slide
18.  Working plan slide
19.  Closing slide
20.  Appendix slide I: Merchandise in improvement
21.  Appendix slide II: Sources and references

Three issues to like about Plantee’s pitch deck

It seems that Plantee’s group has been studying my Pitch Deck Teardowns very rigorously certainly, and it exhibits. The corporate consists of tons of particulars in its deck.

That’s the way you do an introduction!

Slides 1 and a pair of collectively (Slide 1 is on the prime of the article) set the stage for an investor to 100% perceive the what, why and the way of the corporate:

[Slide 2] A one-page abstract to applaud. Picture Credit: Plantee

The opening slides of Plantee Improvements’ pitch deck are rock stable. Between the 2 slides, the founders supply a transparent and fascinating introduction to what the corporate stands for and goals to attain. The succinct overview captures the viewers’s consideration proper from the beginning but additionally serves a twin function of effectively level-setting for buyers and filtering curiosity based mostly on funding thesis alignment. The quilt slide consists of “IoT Smart Home / B2C Consumer Electronics / AgriTech / Raising $1.7M” — it’s mainly key phrase bingo that helps buyers determine whether or not to lean in or whether or not to trash the deck immediately. That’s factor: If this firm isn’t match with buyers, they’ll transfer on immediately.

Gotta love tech answer

I’ll be the primary to confess that I’m a raging nerd, and I really like gadget. I additionally love vegetation; I’ve dozens throughout my residence, and I can maintain most of them alive. As outlined, I really like Plantee’s method to foolproofing plant parenthood.

[Slide 8] Expertise, AI and comfortable vegetation. Picture Credit: Plantee

I’d hazard a guess that almost all plant house owners take into consideration mild precisely as soon as: after they first carry the plant into the home. They’ll consider watering as typically as they’ll, hopefully earlier than the vegetation are a dry, crispy, unhappy mess on the nook of the dresser. I’m glad there’s an AI caring for all the opposite stuff, as a result of I had no concept vegetation wanted a lot!

On the one hand, that’s a reduction. On the opposite, maybe I’m only a naive and novice plant daddy, however it left me somewhat confused. I’ve by no means heard anybody point out air humidification and soil heating. I may very well be persuaded that this stuff make a distinction, certain, however I’m positively curious to what diploma it’s price worrying about.

A superb aggressive panorama

This can be a market that doesn’t have many rivals. Seen by means of one lens, that’s factor: It implies that there’s a thriving market, and Plantee can see what its rivals are doing properly or poorly and place itself accordingly.

[Slide 10] That’s quite a lot of rivals. Picture Credit: Plantee

As a aggressive overview slide, that is fairly complete. It separates the aggressive panorama into “hard to grow” and “easy to grow” and specialist (e.g., mushroom/avocado growers) versus generalist growers. That every one is smart, however there’s nonetheless somewhat piece of the puzzle lacking right here: The one actual exit on this area that I’m conscious of is ScottsMiracle-Gro’s acquisition of AeroGarden, for round $50 million. Not the world’s smallest acquisition, however not wildly encouraging, both.

The opposite query I’ve is whether or not this dichotomy even is smart. If somebody vegetation a bonsai — a selected use case pitched by the Plantee group — they’re most likely not going to repot the plant, which is an attention-grabbing problem. When you’re positioning your self available in the market as a “you can grow anything,” I’d assume that you simply’d need to replant sometimes. The little bonsai tree, nevertheless, can grow up to 800 years, so it’s arduous to assert that the “grows all plants” argument is that robust of a promoting level.

Three issues that Plantee may have improved

On first impression, the Plantee deck is fairly extraordinary, and the AI device gave it a 97% probability of success. As a human investor, I’m much less satisfied, and I disagree with the AI for a number of essential causes.

Does it make sense as a product?

I really like indoor rising system, and there have been many that attempted (and failed) on this area. GROW raised $2.4 million again in 2017, earlier than it will definitely floor to a halt. I reviewed the $1,000 Abby a pair years in the past, which, like Plantee, had pre-sold $100,000 price of merchandise on Kickstarter, and it was pretty awful. I’ve additionally built my own hydroponics system for under $150, which is clearly much more work, however it exhibits that these kind of techniques don’t should be costly.

Plantee is up towards some fairly formidable competitors. On the low finish, for just $40 you’ll be able to choose up a pod-based hydroponic system. If you wish to spend a bit extra, Click & Grow has your back. Rise Gardens recently raised a $9 million round. Folks kill home vegetation on a regular basis, however most of them are fairly straightforward to maintain. When you want some assist, a fast Google seek for “AI plant growing app” offers you dozens of choices, most of them free.

My largest problem with the Plantee deck isn’t what’s there, however it’s what’s lacking: wider context. When you take all the corporate’s claims at face worth, it’s a rare alternative. Nonetheless, zoom out somewhat, and speak to a couple plant lovers, and also you understand that maybe there isn’t as large a spot available in the market as one would possibly assume. It appears that evidently the inherent assumption within the Plantee story is that people who find themselves unhealthy at vegetation will spend $1,400 on a flowery computerized plant pot.

I’d argue that’s a fallacy and that people who find themselves unhealthy at vegetation as a substitute get a kitten, or take up watercolors, or get a plastic plant, earlier than they’re wiling to speculate 4 months of automotive funds on a flowery piece of tech.

So what occurred to that Kickstarter marketing campaign?

[Slide 11] Plantee is arguing entrance and middle that its Kickstarter marketing campaign is a part of the market validation. However there’s a catch. Picture Credit: Plantee

Plantee did, in actual fact, persuade 109 backers to pledge simply over $100,000 for its product. The marketing campaign was fully funded in less than eight hours however was canceled just below a month later.

What occurred? Picture Credit: Screenshot from Kickstarter

That places the Plantee group in a wierd place: It claims that the Kickstarter marketing campaign proves market validation. And that is perhaps true: The corporate says it was in a position to entice its preorder clients for a CAC of $275. By promoting 109 models, fundamental math dictates that the corporate spent about $30,000 to make $100,000 price of gross sales. That’s not too shabby, assuming that there’s sufficient margin within the product to make that buyer acquisition price make sense.

The issue, nevertheless, is that the corporate doesn’t point out wherever within the pitch deck that the marketing campaign was canceled, and it doesn’t talk about why it was canceled. It may argue that it by no means supposed to ship on the Kickstarter marketing campaign and that it was only a advertising take a look at to assist affirm whether or not there was a marketplace for this form of factor.

I’m undecided that is smart. Earlier than Plantee’s marketing campaign, EcoQube ($300,000 funded in 2019), GroBox ($70,000 funded in 2019), Herbert ($280,000 funded in 2019) and dozens of others had already been profitable, and it’s not totally clear what Plantee realized from this train. Since then, a bunch of others have run profitable Kickstarter campaigns (Herbstation, MarsPlanter, GrowChef).

Put merely, I’m struggling to determine how the Kickstarter marketing campaign matches into the general narrative, and by seeming to skirt the problem throughout the deck, Plantee isn’t doing itself any favors. Maybe I’m being painfully delicate after one among my very own Kickstarter campaigns went down in flames a decade ago, and ultimately took the whole company with it, however personally, I’d embody a “so, what happened with the Kickstarter” slide within the appendix to get forward of that a part of the story. Unhealthy information ought to journey quick.

A bit of on the dramatic aspect

I really like some good storytelling, don’t get me flawed, however components of this pitch deck appear to have misplaced all perspective. Phrases like “never lose another green child,” “It started when my good friend died,” and “stress affecting the mental health of growers” are undoubtedly highly effective and emotionally charged, however to these of us who’ve misplaced good friend, had critical psychological well being challenges, or truly misplaced a human baby, it appears fairly tasteless to match the huge and nearly insufferable ache of that with shedding a home plant.

[Slide 5] I’m sorry in your loss, Ondra, however that is bordering on unhealthy style. Picture Credit: Plantee.

The total pitch deck

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