this HillBilly clothing company is a joke. they're making a big deal about the logo, it's font in a circle. also, who the hell even says "hill billy" anymore? also, i love when people say "people come up to us and ask..." the question never sound natural, and more than likely horsecrap

Completely disagree, I think it has a very good chance of becoming a strong brand for that market segment. That same market wears clothing from their tractor brand as casual wear. They seem to embrace anything that reinforces that culture/lifestyle choice and "Hill Billy" is a pretty direct statement. Plus I think the logo is done quite well, except that I would expect John Deere to sue for trademark infringement.

Does anyone else think the 7% royalty was a pretty bad deal for them? I just don't see how anyone who is passionate about their product settles for $70k off every $1mm in sales.

What am I missing here?

is it that easy? I'm gonna go out and trademark the term "wiseguy" or something and simply type it, circle it, and have my cousin put it on solid colored t shirts. what a product! go to their website and look at their product line, nothing buy genric t's and a couple of trucker hates.

to be fair, they do have a shirt with a stock photo of a marlin on it too "Hillbilly fishing" do Hillbillys even fish for Marlin? Horrible product, and i hope they fail.

Whats so hard to understand, it's the Ed Hardy of farm clothes. I'm also surprised at the royalty rates that have been offered several times as it seems like a bad idea. After searching around a bit though it seems to be the industry standard. I just think they could have gotten a larger upfront offering for the brand.

its not the Ed Hardy, b/c at the very least Ed Hardy has a distinct style, and designs. They put a word on a shirt. I can make their shirts in 10 minutes. the guys were all prideful like they reinvented the wheel. they have a word.

still a better product than that family who have bracelets with trading coins. they were God awful. Broccoli Wad was also stupid as a store i used to work in sold that exact product but for women.

I really can't understand Mark Cuban when it comes to investing. He says some good stuff about business but I would have thought that he is a troll for the stuff that he has written about the stock market (if I didn't know who wrote some of those articles).

Cuban makes the fantastic claim that diversification is a fraud by stockbrokers and Wall St., a buy and hold strategy does not work.....and then quotes Buffett saying that Buffett recommends that you only invest in business that you know. Buffett actually recommends that the vast majority of people adopt extreme diversification and should not attempt to earn high returns. They should not try to beat the market. Only investors that are really dedicating themselves should actively seek out investing opportunities.

You could have come up with it but didn't. They did. Come up with another word with a circle that people want on their shirts and you can make money too. You can't copy them since its trademarked.

Stealing this.

Overall this show wasn't as good. Pretty obvious they did a few ideas with southern influence (jerky and hill billy) since Foxworthy was there.

Although he isn't as interesting or flamboyant, I'm looking forward to Harrington being back next week. At least he has some mildly good business insights. Just my 2 cents.

Thought the last couple shows were decent. But it looks like they are bringing Foxworthy back for another one (obviously taped at the same time). I hope it is better than the last show with him.

We need more Mark Cuban!

How good of an "opportunity" do you guys think it would be to get your business on Shark Tank? Or I guess a better question might be, under what circumstances would you take this opportunity?

I'm thinking the platform of the show makes the opportunity much less valuable than it appears. The platform creates a dynamic in which:

• The Sharks can make extremely aggressive offers b/c none of them even need to invest in any single business. Kevin O'Leary reminds of this every other show when he tells ppl that hes "heard the same pitch 10x this morning, the great thing about being an entrepreneur is there are always more opportunities, and if they leave it is a blank slate, I will forget you instantly and move on to the next pitch". This puts the Sharks in an incredible power position. This is probably true for VCs as well though too.
  
• The platform gives the illusion of competition amongst the sharks, but as we have seen, when the sharks start to undercut each other they usually ask the fish to leave. They then proceed to bring each other in on the deal and then come back with a higher position than before. I doubt this happens with VC firms
  
• The fish are put in a high pressure situation, clearly outside of their comfort zones, and then repeatedly asked to make on the spot decisions. I'm not sure if these are legally binding, but at the minimum they set strong anchors for post show negotiations.

It seems to me that you should only take this "opportunity" if you are otherwise dead in the water or just have no idea how to run/grow a business from the onset of an idea.

Or would you counter that the network and capital of the sharks is more than enough to pay a premium price for their partnership; b/c who cares what the deal was if I'm making millions amirite?

Thoughts?

You get free advertising too, so that can't hurt too badly. You don't have to accept the offer. I think you do have to pay a royalty to ABC though. The Sharks won't give you crap unless your business is already making good money, in which case you don't need them most times.

They do have connections which seem to help out in a lot of cases.

I think the potato pie guy from the first season exemplifies the advantage of Shark Tank. He got the publicity of making a deal in the tank, and then made appearances on nation-wide shows (good morning america was one, I think), causing his sales to explode.

This show is interesting. My wife's cousin actually turned down appearing on this show after he passed the final round and was asked to go on TV. He wasn't really allowed to say what made him turn it down, but he insinuated that something wasn't kosher with the process. I know something would have had to have been wrong because the deal he had in mind to get wouldn't even require him to give up his own equity, but rather his angel investors' equity so he was on a freeroll. I believe you have to give up around 2% of your company just to appear on the show.

I watch the show religiously and think that only certain businesses really succeed on this show with or without making a deal. I think that focused simple products at the startup level really thrive (elephant thermometer and grill charms come to mind) as do certain types of ecommerce businesses (customizable granola bar site and Toy rental site). Certain franchising concepts work for promotion, though they don't normally make a deal (this is what my wife's cousin was going on to do). I think this was evidenced by the Games2U guys and the two mothers who sold franchises for entertaining kids)

I have a feeling that a lot of people go on this show to get publicity about their business and because I am sure some other VCs watch the show and deals are made with businesses that can't come to a deal with the sharks.

If I had a good/focused product and was in startup mode, I would certainly be willing to give a good chunk of equity to speed up the potential of getting mass distribution.

I almost literally want to murder that bald dickhead shark.

i was dvr'ing this on the BBC channel a couple years ago or so and then no more. Did they stop making it? Thought it was much better than the US version.

He's bad, but he's not that bad. I'm sure they have him play it up for the cameras.

No its still on here in Canada I think it is a bit better also.

Reference that hose bib. Dont they have something similar already for garden hoses?

Also the wedding runner lady was a bitch. I think she just went on for the free advertising.

Also the bald guy is like that on the CDN version also

Hah. He's kind of a dick, but I feel like the show is edited a bit in their reactions. The impression I get of him is that his major concern is getting the business at a discount to their current value with their growth potential as a secondary factor. Robert Herjavec appears much more willing to pay close to current value for the investments and is more concerned with the growth potential instead. Considering you're going to be a partner with whoever you invest in I personally think this is a much wiser approach.

Did anyone see the latest episode where Cuban offered 1.25 million, plus 7.5% royalty on a three-year employment contract with a salary of $ 100,000 per year to the fireman for everything and, Kevin O’Leary offered 500k plus 5% royalty but he wasn't going to buy the fire hose socket. I loled when O'leary was clearly offering a worse deal for the guy but was bashing cuban to try and get the guy to take it. Either way I think the fireman should have countered mark 1.25 million for 80% plus 7.5 royalty and no employment contract so he could at least have kept an equity stake. It's riskier with no guaranteed salary, but he is getting 1.25 million up front and he still gets a nice equity stake

knew that wedding woman would be a b*tch

also, the speaker was a pretty awesome invention

the Cuban/firefighter deal was sick right? Kevin was just being a jackass

not sure if its been said yet, but dragons den was originally created and aired in japan, and then rose to fame when it was made in the uk.

eventually it spread out and was remade in a bunch of different countries including nigeria, russia, canada and australia. here for more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragons'_Den

the UK version is amazing and probably one of my favourite shows of all time.

I was like wow, these guys are going to be super super rich when they demo'ed the speaker, but felt cheated when they said that all they were doing was distributing the thing

+1

I'm happy that someone (wedding aisle lady) finally countered the Shark's strict valuation by current year revenue approach. They have been abusing people using that method, which has allowed them to set pretty deep anchors. The fish always being so shell shocked by it also baffles me. Do they really not watch the show whatsoever beforehand?