Glim Skim's DHDL appearance: One of the "weakest we've ever seen" – This is how things continued for the founders

The Lions had a lot to criticize about the Glim Skin founders' pitch. They revealed to Gründerszene what they learned from their performance and what their future has been like since then.

In the first episode of the new season of "The Lion's Den," the two founders Benita Botterhuis and Friederike Kogelheide pitched Glim Skin. It's an electronic skin care device that uses cold plasma to improve pimples and skin imperfections. The two brought a prototype with them to their appearance, as a product ready for production didn't yet exist at the time. They offered ten percent of the company shares for €300,000. If the deal had gone through, that would have represented a valuation of €3 million. For a startup with no sales, no production, and no online shop, that would have been too much, says TV personality Carsten Maschmeyer , who pulled out early. He also criticized Botterhuis and Kogelheide for not conducting a comparative study. At the time of the TV recording, the two had only conducted a tolerability study with 20 test subjects.

Entrepreneur Dagmar Wöhrl also believes the valuation is too high. Several founders pitch on DHDL who only have a prototype. "But they're also reserved with their valuation because they know full well they're not ready yet," says Wöhrl.

When asked what Glim Skin's unique selling point (USP) was, the two founders answered with its innovative technology, the product's longevity, and the fact that Glim Skin works without additives. According to Maschmeyer, the same could be said for a toaster. The judges weren't convinced. The three other lions, Nils Glagau , Judith Williams , and Ralf Dümmel, didn't offer the Glim Skin founders a deal either. Glagau said that "it's not enough in every respect at the moment." After Botterhuis and Kogelheide left the cave, Maschmeyer described the performance as one of the "weakest we've ever seen."

Some time has passed since the recording. Botterhuis reveals what happened after the show. "The performance was a valuable experience for us. We received a lot of feedback that we were able to work on afterwards, and we also had the chance to present our idea to industry insiders," says the founder. After the performance, Botterhuis and Kogelheide developed the prototype into a production-ready product and, according to their own statements, now have over 1,000 customers. The product is sold primarily through their own online shop and through their own store. "We are currently in the process of establishing additional distribution channels. This includes distribution through perfumeries, drugstores, and pharmacies," says Botterhuis.

However, a comparative study has still not been conducted. "Double-blind studies are more commonly found in medical contexts. These aren't that easy to conduct for the application of cold plasma, because you can smell, feel, and hear the plasma application," explains Botterhuis. However, they now have "significantly more meaningful comparison photos" from the first test subjects from their personal environment and from the tolerability study, because this was also criticized on the show. Beauty entrepreneur Williams said that better results could be seen with other active ingredients than those shown in the Glim Skin comparison image.

The two founders have also "significantly sharpened their USPs," says Botterhuis. Glim Skin now focuses on user-friendliness and the "pay once, use forever" concept. Thanks to the interchangeable hygiene attachments, the product can even be used by multiple people in a household.

Although they weren't able to convince the lions, the founders still closed a financing round after the show. "We were able to convince several business angels of our idea and concept, thus raising a six-figure sum in debt," says Botterhuis. They also received a convertible loan from NRW-Bank, the NRW.SeedCon.