'Shark Tank' contestant sparks heated war among judges with his clever broom invention
Investors on “Shark Tank” can be quite brutal when it comes to grilling an entrepreneur. However, once in a while, a product so innovative yet so simple will come around that almost every single Shark will want a piece of it. When that happens, the targets of the grilling become other sharks. The investors are brutal, and they do not hesitate to put someone down to get a deal. That is exactly what happened in an earlier episode.
The entrepreneur was a man named Shane Pannell, and he sought $40,000 for a 25% stake in his company, Sweep Easy. Pannell said that he hadn’t sold any units yet as he was working with prototypes, and that he was a one-man company. Such revelations would usually not have the best reactions from the Sharks, but this guy had a product that impressed them all.
The product was a simple broom with a built-in floor scraper that would come out at the push of the handle. The scraper would get all those stubborn stains off the floor that a broom could never do. The product was simple to understand, and yet so innovative that everyone loved it. The best part of it all was that it was so easy to understand and use. The entrepreneur might have expected his pitch to go well in the first place.
However, he probably could not have expected the war that started among the sharks to get a deal. Kevin O’Leary was the first to make an offer, as he said he’d pay $40,000 for a 20% stake in the company. This was an even better deal than what the entrepreneur had asked for. However, before he could even offer a deal, Kevin Harrington jumped in and asked him to exercise a little patience.
O’Leary believed that the way forward for the product was to license it around the globe and make as much money as possible off it. After Harrington came in, O’Leary even increased his offer to $50,000. However, Harrington believed the way forward for the business is to grow it in the United States first before licensing and selling it worldwide. Being a TV guy, he believed that he could get the product on TV screens around the world.
Harrington offered $50,000 for 25% of the company. But these two were not the only Sharks interested. Daymond John and Robert Herjavec also wanted a part of the action. So, John teamed up with Harrington to offer $80,000 for 25%, and Herjavec teamed up with Mr. Wonderful to make the same offer. Pannell was overwhelmed by all the offers and said that he needed to speak to his wife.
O’Leary said he’d speak to the entrepreneur’s wife, and John asked him to stop embarrassing himself. Clearly, this was a product that everyone believed in. Ultimately, after all the verbal jibes among the Sharks, the entrepreneur made the choice to cut a deal with John and Harrington, leaving the other two disappointed.
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