Sugru — an investment failure but worldwide success

The press headlines focus on the fact that investors lost 90% of their investment. Irish Times.

The story they don’t tell is how the global community of fixers and makers will continue to grow.

Sugru sold for only £7.6m. @localglobe.vc we lost most of our investment as did others.

Jane invented Sugru to help get more people fixing and making. Over the last 15 years, as a growing and increasingly experienced team, Sugru has been dedicated to inspiring and enabling an amazing global community. The mission, to beat throwaway culture with imagination, creativity and practical action, has reached millions of people around the world. Sugru fixing stories are shared every day by ingenious fixers from Brooklyn to Berlin to Brazil and Bangkok.

However, despite significant commercial achievements such as a thriving online sales model that includes a growing presence on Amazon globally, along with solid flagship retail accounts like Target and B&Q, Sugru struggled to realise its commercial ambitions and grow the business in line with targets. To build mainstream awareness for Sugru, along with mass retail distribution, takes much longer, and requires more investment than any of us imagined.

The buyer has 100 years of experience of selling consumer adhesive products on a mass scale. They will be able to bring Sugru to many millions more people and achieve the mission on an exciting new scale.

You’ll still be able to buy Sugru everywhere you can today. The community, the social media presence, its newsletters and place in the wider fixing movement, will remain.

Post script: VCs are famous for trumpeting their successful investments (and we’ll continue to do so) — sometimes we need to talk about our failures — especially when they are successes in other ways.