Marnie

Hi, Guy and Sarah.

My name's Marnie, and I'm calling from a little coastal town on the East Coast in Australia.

My business is called Tick Socks, which are fun socks with built-in tick protection.

I've been working on it for over a year, and it finally launched last month.

So they have built-in permethrin, which is factory bonded.

I license an existing textile technology.

And it lasts through 70 washes versus the DIY methods that outdoorsy people like hikers are used to doing, which lasts about six washes.

Um, so a few years ago I was, um, outside with my newborn son, giving him some nudie rudie time, which is diaper free time.

Yeah.

Um, swatting mosquitoes away from him.

Uh, we were just fresh home from hospital, so I really didn't want to spray him with anything.

I'm obviously pro insect repellent, but this was a time when we weren't even putting, you know, gentle soaps in the bath.

He was so fresh and new.

So I found myself thinking, what if the blanket that he was lying on could have the repellent in it rather than me putting it on his skin?

So they're sold in a box of four for $119 US, which includes shipping.

So it's direct to consumer just in the US for a couple of reasons.

Like it's a much larger market to launch and validate the idea.

And also the insect repellent industry is heavily regulated.

So it made more sense to launch in one market and validate rather than going global and dealing with all of the regulations of all the different countries at the same time.

They are a huge problem here, but we don't have the tick-borne disease to the extent that the US has.