ABC's "Shark Tank," now in its 15th season, has made millionaires out of entrepreneurs and further lined the pockets of the "sharks" who invest in their products. But which stand apart from the pack?
In 2019, USA TODAY exclusively revealed the 20 top-selling products of all time on the show, and now we have an update: Three new products have joined the top 15 list featured below, including Dude Wipes, a line of wet wipes marketed to men, which has cleaned up with $341 million in sales, and PRx Performance, which has sold $200 million worth of racks for home exercise equipment. (Both were pitched in Season 7.)
Also new to the list is Blueland, a line of refillable cleaning products, which won an investment in Season 11.
So far this fall, entrepreneurs have pitched products ranging from men's leggings and frozen Beef Wellingtons to a pet-sitting service for weddings, and the sharks ‒ Barbara Corcoran, Mark Cuban, Daymond John, Robert Herjavec, Kevin "Mr. Wonderful" O'Leary and Lori Greiner ‒ are joined by new "guest sharks" including Sprinkles cupcakes founder Candace Nelson, horror producer Jason Blum and Mike Rubin of Fanatics, the largest seller of licensed sports merchandise.
What has changed on the show (Fridays, 8 EDT/PDT; streaming next day on Hulu)? A move back to basics, Corcoran says.
"The entrepreneurs got too fancy over the years. They had money from their family and friends; they were rich kids," she says. "This season, everybody’s an entrepreneur; everybody’s needy," a function of casting directors "listening to the audience. They want to identify with anyone who’s there pitching, not some sophisticated person who has a lot of privilege."
The investors frequently ask, "Why do you need a shark?" But "they never have a good answer," Corcoran says, and many appear simply to seek free publicity, because a 10-minute spiel in the Tank can instantly catapult sales. (The show averages more than 4 million weekly viewers just on ABC.)
Adds Corcoran: "Why bother spending a lot of money and a lot of time doing due diligence and after the show spending a lot of time with the entrepreneurs if you can’t help them?"
The new top 15 products:
Cumulative sales as of May 2023; source: Sony Pictures Television (*newly added since 2019)
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Tops in 2019:The new list of the 20 best-selling products from 'Shark Tank'
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