Sarah Forrai's mom introduced her to ice facials but rolling ice cubes around your face didn’t work great. They were slippery and made a mess.

Sarah also suffers from Raynaud’s disease which caused her hands to have decreased blood flow, which made them feel cool or numb, especially while holding an ice cube.

So she looked for something that would hold the ice, but didn’t find anything.

The lightbulb went off.

With her partner, Lewis Battersby, by her side they designed the first ice facial tool, the Contour Cube. Their background in design and Lewis’ 3D printer were put to good use.

It worked. It kept her hands from freezing and it didn’t slip.

She was 29 and ready to launch the company on TikTok in February 2021. The first video went viral immediately racking up 500k views and they sold out overnight.

The next video hit 7 million views.

They put up an email list to notify people when they were back in stock. 20,000 people signed up.

In the first four months they sold $54k. The second year revenue jumped to $260k aided by $80k in ad spend. Then Kendall Jenner posted a picture of her with one (completely organic) saying that she loved it for her morning ice facials. They sold $25k in the following two weeks.

It continued to grow. They’re now in 450 Priceline stores in Australia and all the Chemist Warehouse stores in New Zealand. Their trailing 12 months revenue hit $1.3 million with $200k in ad spend. Their total lifetime sales is split with $500k through wholesale and the remaining online.

And, being two pieces of plastic, it has great margins. The mini retails for $29.95, costs $3.90 to make and wholesales for $14.

At the end of last year Sarah and Lewis got more publicity when they were featured on Shark Tank Australia and managed to close a deal with four sharks ($375k for 30% of the business).

So what are they doing now? Launching more TikTok videos. Shipping more product and trying to outpace the knock offs that are coming, despite their trademarks and patent (pending).

So What Could You Do?

• Some women use it for hot flashes without the hassle of a wet towel, you could market a version specifically for that purpose

• You could sell directly to men, none of the competition is currently doing that, but it could be a winner as a post shave treatment

• You could create formulations to be frozen or included in the ice facials for better skin

I also think the way to do a simple product like this is similar to the Rabbit wine opener. That founder knew his product would be copied. So he made a cheaper one and sold both versions so they owned each side of the market.

Business Ideas of the Week

• Alarming study on microplastics will boost sales of glass and metal water bottles… air quality will be next… start a biz in cleaning water or air and you’ll have a large market

• Sevens. A pillow case brand that sells a seven pack of pillow cases. Tagline. “Would you sleep in your t-shirt for a week straight?”

Business Success Stories of the Week

• The Black Stuff (natural soap and deodorant) hits $3 million, reminds me of Dr. Squatch

• Kagi, a search engine with no ads and a monthly fee passes 23k members (approximately $2.8 million in ARR)

• Brez (premium THC drink) subscription signs ups are on a tear, interesting story too