Accepted: Accepted into Alma Angels

TwistedWishes

Felicity Woodcraft · Consumer · Pre-Seed · January 2026

How Felicity leveraged community feedback to sharpen her consumer brand pitch and gain acceptance into the Alma Angels network.

~4 months

Time to Acceptance

From first upload to Alma Angels

Alma Angels

Network

Angel investor network focused on diverse founders

6 sessions

Feedback Sessions

With mentors and community members

The Journey

🎁

September 2025

Initial Deck Upload

Felicity uploaded her pitch deck for TwistedWishes, a consumer gifting platform, and received instant AI feedback.

🤝

October 2025

Mentor Matching

Connected with consumer-focused mentors who helped refine unit economics and customer acquisition strategy.

🎤

November 2025

Pitch Practice

Participated in community pitch sessions, receiving real-time feedback on storytelling and consumer metrics.

🏆

January 2026

Alma Angels Acceptance

Accepted into Alma Angels with a clear consumer thesis and strong retention narrative.

“As a consumer brand founder, I was struggling to articulate my unit economics in a way investors understood. The mentors here helped me translate customer love into investor language — retention curves, LTV projections, and viral coefficients.”

— Felicity Woodcraft, Founder of TwistedWishes

Lessons Learned

How did you strengthen your consumer brand pitch for investors?

Consumer brands need to prove they are not just a fad. I learned to lead with retention data, not just acquisition numbers. Showing that customers came back 3+ times within 60 days was more powerful than any growth chart. The AI analysis specifically called out that my deck was heavy on vision and light on proof — that was the wake-up call I needed.

What was the biggest challenge in your fundraising journey?

Getting investors to take a consumer gifting startup seriously in a market dominated by tech plays. I had to reframe TwistedWishes from "a gift company" to "a consumer retention engine." The community helped me find the right positioning by stress-testing my narrative against what investors actually fund.

What would you tell other consumer founders?

Do not underestimate the power of community feedback. Investors see hundreds of decks, and the ones that stand out are the ones where founders clearly had their assumptions challenged before walking into the room. Also, start tracking cohort retention early — it is the single most important metric for consumer businesses.

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