Adelaide Potgieter is an entrepreneur and founder of
MadWorld, a diverse group of companies consisting of a creative communications agency, recording studio, chat room, set-construction, restaurants, and property development.
A law school dropout and Miss SA semi-finalist, Adelaide refers to her tertiary education as obtaining a 'Doctorate through the University of Life.'
With the gift of the gab, Adelaide briefly tried her hand at a few ventures such as selling luxury cars before the single mother of two launched MadWorld in 1998 with R1500 in her pocket and a rickety car.
Adelaide found herself fixated on landing the Shoprite Checkers account but knew a unique strategy would be necessary to capture the attention of CEO Whitey Basson.
In a neat cardboard box, Adelaide packed the arm and leg of a mannequin and addressed it to the company’s big boss in the hopes that the symbol of giving an ‘arm and leg’ to work with his brand would strike a chord with Basson.
A few weeks later a box was delivered to the MadWorld office: “Thank you for the arm and the leg, but you have forgotten the most important part of the body, the heart!” It went on to say that Basson was eagerly awaiting the rest of the body of the proposal.
The bold move opened the door to an official account pitch alongside other much larger agencies, but Mad World came out on top and still services the Checkers account nearly 15 years later.
Some of the more recent prominent accolades of MadWorld include winning Best Television Series for Die Nataniël Tafel in the Huisgenoot Tempo Awards.