Lisa Maree Boersma was raised in Springwood and Yellow Rock and after school she'd help her dad Leo with the bookkeeping for his health products and picture framing businesses.
Now 32, Ms Boersma lives in Bondi and is the co-founder of Glamazon, a booking app for the beauty industry, linking customers with freelance stylist and salons.
Ms Boersma and her business partner Lauren Silvers featured on Channel Ten’s reality TV show Shark Tank last Tuesday, sealing a deal with tech entrepreneur and investor Steve Baxter.
Baxter bought a 25 per cent stake and $250,000 investment in the company.
The show gives budding entrepreneurs the chance to bring their dreams to fruition by presenting their ideas to the five sharks (investors) to try to convince any one of the sharks to invest money in their idea.
The show was filmed in November last year and Glamazon was launched in December.
Ms Boersma said the company was now valued at $2 million and 13,000 people used the app, available Australia-wide.
“There’s a big cultural shift happening … with Airbnb and Uber, people are more comfortable staying in a stranger’s home. Ten years ago they didn’t think of it,” Ms Boersma said.
“Peer to peer services are more prevalent now and more convenient.”
The St Thomas Aquinas Primary and St Columba’s High School student said she originally had thought of creating a mobile beauty services company which would visit clients in their home. On meeting an investor last year who said if she merged her idea with Ms Silver’s salon-booking app concept he would invest, Glamazon was born.
Ms Boersma also has a fashion label called Lisa Maree that she established eight years ago and runs successfully in the United States without much assistance from her. She releases three collections a year.
She said anyone could start their own business, it required commitment and self-belief.
It’s trial and error, and you definitely have to be in it to win it. Give it a go and give it your best shot.
- Lisa Maree Boersma
“It’s trial and error, and you definitely have to be in it to win it. Give it a go and give it your best shot,” Ms Boersma said.
She also recommended never being afraid to ask for help, because there was lots of expertise out there if only people asked for help rather than isolating themselves.