Barb Stegemann didn’t set out to make anyone cry when she appeared on CBC TV’s hit show Dragon’s Den.

But her passionate appeal for support for her fragrance, designed to help Afghans become self-sufficient by growing the blossoms to produce essential oils for the 7 Virtues Afghanistan Orange Blossom Eau de Parfum, brought hard-nosed dragons Arlene Dickinson and W. Brett Wilson to tears.

Dickinson, Wilson and Jim Treliving agreed to provide the Bedford entrepreneur with $75,000 in exchange for a 15 per cent share of her company, the 7 Virtues Beauty Inc., making her the first woman from Atlantic Canada to secure a deal in the den.

"I didn’t want them to cry, so I shared the thank-yous I’ve gotten from all over the world with them and I started crying," Stegemann said the morning after the show’s Wednesday night airing.

"Talking about it, it’s a really human thing."

Wearing a bright pink blouse and black pants that echoed the colours in the packaging of her perfume deemed beautiful by Dickinson, Stegemann began her presentation with a giant poster with a photo of an orange blossom and a smaller one of the fragrance bottle and the words Perfume not Poppies —a reference to the poppies many Afghan farmers grow for the opium trade.

"The farmers make money, the supplier makes money, the retailer makes money and I make money," she told the panel, noting she pays $8,000 for a litre of the essential oil, above market value, to encourage the farmers to see the benefit of switching crops.

Dickinson, who has visited Afghanistan, smiled and nodded in agreement when Stegemann said she believed in empowerment, not charity. "I should be a partner," she said.

Wilson talked about investing with a social conscience and showing "we can make money while we’re doing it."

After Stegemann walked out of the den with deal in hand, she was praised by the Dragons for her professionalism and for presenting a real product with a great cause instead of coming in with a sob story.

The 41-year-old mother of two had been in business for about two months at the time the episode was filmed on May 22 in Toronto.

She told the Dragons she had sold about $30,000 worth of scent, priced at $70 for a 50-ml bottle, at Mills in Halifax, Noor in Toronto and through her website, www.the7virtues.com.

She’s relieved she no longer has to keep the deal a secret.

Also an author and motivational speaker, she used the Dragons’ money to expand her production from 1,000 bottles to 10,000, the number needed to approach the Bay.

The department store has agreed to stock the orange blossom scent and her newest fragrance — the 7 Virtues Noble Rose of Afghanistan, launched in November — in major centres from Dartmouth’s Mic Mac Mall to Vancouver in time for the debut of the Dragon’s Den episode.

Stegemann was in Toronto for meetings about launching the perfume into suburban stores when the episode aired and watched it in a pub along with people from the Bay and Noor, and old friends from her days as a journalism student at the University of King’s College in Halifax.

Watching herself on TV was hard.

"I felt like I was so intense, but I was really pleased I was able to communicate what I felt so passionate about. I’m so excited about working with the brightest lights in the country. My dream came true and I got my money."

Since the episode aired she’s been flooded with "beautiful emails and calls from friends and strangers all over the world" and has been interviewed by CBC Radio Maritime Noon host Norma Lee MacLeod and stations including Q104 in Halifax and X-FM in her hometown of Antigonish, among others.

And she’s been fielding orders on the website – including five that came in during our 10-minute phone interview.

Meanwhile, she and Toronto-based perfumer Susanne Lang, who collaborated on the other scents, are working on a third unisex fragrance using the vetiver oil of Haiti; she hopes to launch it in time for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day.

( anemetz@herald.ca)