SHE’s the only Apprentice runner-up to still win an investment from Lord Sugar - and she has more than made that money work.
Susie Ma took his £200,000 for a 50 per cent share in her Tropic skincare brand and turned it into a £73million fortune, which has now seen her named on the 's 40 under 40.
Not bad for the girl who started out making face scrubs at her mum’s kitchen table aged 15 and selling them at weekends on Greenwich market.
Last year she bought Lord Sugar out - making him millions while giving her back sole control of her empire.
Until now Tropic has been 35-year-old Susie’s only baby, but she has just announced that she is expecting her first child with her partner Matt - a little girl.
She took to Instagram in March to share their news, writing: “So excited to share that we’re pregnant. Officially sharing with our 900 Ambassador leaders this morning at our annual leaders event. 12 weeks today and cannot wait to meet her.”
Juggling motherhood with being the boss of a multi-million pound empire, which involves employing more than 450 people and managing 20,000 brand ambassadors, should be a doddle for Susie who has never been shy of hard work.
From the kitchen of the family’s home in Croydon, Susie - who grew up in Queensland and Cairns before moving to London at 13 - experimented with the body scrub her grandma made in Australia.
She explained: “It was a blend of fresh sea salts that would exfoliate your skin, macadamia and jojoba oil, lemon myrtle to ward off mosquitos, and then I added bergamot and eucalyptus to the first batch.
“I decided to call it Tropic just because the ingredients were from somewhere tropical.”
Over the school summer holidays, Susie spent Thursdays to Sundays selling at the same market as her mum, whose stall sold everything from scarfs to wooden wind spirals.
“My goal was to be able to earn enough money so that I could afford my way through university,” she said. “My business was just supposed to be a means to an end.”
For the next five years, Susie continued to run her business alongside her studies and averaged a very healthy £800 a week in profit.
By the time she was 21, she had earned enough cash to put down a deposit for a house for her mum, a second investment property and fund her way through uni.
In the final year of her degree she shut down Tropic to concentrate on her studies, and was headed for the corporate life when she landed a job in the city.
But in 2010 she spotted a Facebook post about the new series of The Apprentice and knew this could be her chance to relaunch Tropic - and make it huge.
Susie said: “It was the first year they changed the prize from a £100,000 job to a £250,000 investment and 50 per cent share of your business. I wouldn’t have applied for it if it was the job.
“But it was the fact that it was Lord Sugar owning half of your business - that’s your PR sorted. And that investment would allow me to expand out of my mum’s kitchen.”
To Lord Sugar, £200k was like £20. In the meeting, it was like he was just signing a bill - like he’s just had a meal out. It was the best moment of my life
Susie Ma
Out of 73,000 applicants, Susie made it to the final four and was the youngest candidate to ever appear on the show at just 21 years old.
Despite making it to the final rounds, Susie lost out on the top prize to Tom Pellereau.
But Lord Sugar’s right-hand man Nick Hewer later told his boss that he would’ve invested in Susie’s business, which prompted him to take a second look.
Meanwhile Susie invested £8,000 of her personal savings to take Tropic to the Ideal Home show in London.
“I’d never worked so hard in my life,” she said.
“I was getting up at 6am, selling all day and making scrubs with my mum until 4 in the morning. I did that for 21 days straight.
"It killed me. I was like a zombie. But it was all worth it because the money that I earned was what convinced Lord Sugar.”
On December 1, 2011, Lord Sugar invested £200,000 for a 50 per cent share of Tropic.
She continued: “To him, £200,000 was like £20. In the meeting, it was like he was just signing a bill - like he’s just had a meal out. It was the best moment of my life. I did a little hop when I left his boardroom.”
The pair came up with the idea of a direct selling model - friends selling to friends - and in 2013 offered the opportunity to become Tropic ambassadors to 400 customers and travelled the country teaching women how to do demonstrations of products and filming tutorials.
20 years on from her market stall and Susie now employs more than 350 members of staff across 34 countries, and has 20,000 ambassadors who have sold to over 2.5m customers in the UK.
In 2021 it recorded a record turnover of more than £90m with a pre-tax profit of £10.5m.
Bu despite turnover dropping to £65m in 2022 due to the after-effects of the pandemic, Susie is a huge philanthropist and the company paid for 6 million school days for 160 schools around the world.
And now she is back in sole control, Susie has vowed to be an “unstoppable force for good”, writing on her Instagram: “Forever grateful for Lord Sugar’s investment into a 50 per cent share of Tropic 12 years ago, and even more grateful he’s agreed to sell it back to me.
“This business is my life. The people, the products, the children we educate. It means everything to me.
“A new chapter with the most inspiring family of Tropic Ambassadors and the most talented team at HQ. I can’t wait to see what the future holds. Here’s to being an unstoppable force for good.”
