Cup Board Pro
The Cup Board Pro was a product originally created by a former firefighter from Long Island. The inventor was also the firehouse chef and designed it to fit a need he found lacking in other cutting boards. The board features a removable tray in which scraps can be swept while cutting as well as liquids caught.
The inventor was a two-time Chopped champion and decided to pursue his dream of appearing on Shark Tank after his wife was diagnosed and then died from breast cancer. He made it from bamboo and is imprinted with a fireman logo featuring the number of firefighters who died on September 11th, 2001. He also acquired three patents for the board.
In 2017, just after the inventor received the first 2,000 units of the Cup Board Pro, he was diagnosed with a cancer his children believed to be related to the work he performed at the World Trade Center in the days and months after September 11th, and died.
The entrepreneurs in the tank are the inventors three children, two daughters and a son, who want to see their father's product reach consumers. They stated that they just started selling the board three weeks before filming, including on an online store. In that time, they sold 300 units. All of their marketing thus far has been on social media.
Each unit costs $12.50 to manufacture and sells for $40 at retail.
The entrepreneurs are looking for an investment to renew the tooling required to make the board and inventory as well as $20,000 set aside for marketing.
Making A Deal
Moved by the story of how both of the parents of the young entrepreneurs passed and how they carried on with the product in honor of their father, the sharks came together to offer a deal in which all five of them were involved. Each of the sharks would receive 4% of the company for a combined 20% (versus the 10% the entrepreneurs originally offered) in return for the $100,000 of investment.
While it's easy to be touched by the story and even the sharks seemingly setting aside their shark tendencies, when one actually looks at the deal, they still bit 50% (or $500,000) from the original value of the company when the entrepreneurs entered the tank... That said, they did promise to donate all of their profits to a charity of the entrepreneurs' choice making it, essentially, a 20% pledge of all company earnings to charity.
Updates
Just a little later in the same season, Shark Tank aired an update where the entrepreneurs stated that they sold through all of their father's inventory and that they received over 100,000 emails in support. They were also introduced to Williams-Sonoma, an upscale kitchen supply company that licensed the product to sell under their own brand. Additionally, the entrepreneurs set up a site to receive donations to help support firefighters and have, so far, given $41,000 to a firefighters' foundation.
Some of the above was confirmed by an ABC News reports on February 26th, 2020[1]. Additionally, through the article, it's learned that the sharks don't take their 20% equity in profit but instead donate it back to to a firefighters' charity. Additionally, it mentions that the Cup Board Pro sold through all of their available inventory while the episode was still airing on the East Coast and was sold out by the time it aired on the West Coast and that 130,000 people attempted to purchase the product (almost epitomizing the concept of the Shark Tank Bump).
Supposedly, according to the article, Williams-Sonoma says that the Cup Board Pro is "the fastest selling and most popular cutting board in the history of [the store]."
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