Keeping Your Subs Safe and Making a Deal with the Sharks

Art of the Kickstart

Frustration with soggy sandwiches paved a path for Desiree Haller of SubSafe to create a new product, leading to a new business and a deal with the Sharks on Shark Tank. Tune in to this week’s episode of the podcast to learn more about building a great product, growing a company and making a deal with the Sharks. Topics Discussed and Key Crowdfunding Takeaways Why solving a need is the key to a great product How to overcome prototyping challenges when designing a new product How to determine your target market for a new product How long the process of getting on Shark Tank actually takes What to expect when you audition for Shark Tank Tips for making a deal with the Sharks Links SubSafe How to Win at the Sport of Business: If I Can Do It, You Can Do It by Mark Cuban Invent It, Sell It, Bank It!: Make Your Million-Dollar Idea into a Reality by Lori Greiner Who's Afraid of a Large Black Man? by Charles Barkley Sponsors Art of the Kickstart is honored to be sponsored by The Gadget Flow, a product discovery platform that helps you discover, save, and buy awesome products. The Gadget Flow is the ultimate buyer's guide for cool luxury gadgets and creative gifts. Click here to learn more and list your product - use coupon code ATOKK16 for 20% off! Transcript View this episode's transcript Roy Morejon: Welcome to Art of the Kickstart, your source for crowdfunding campaign success. I’m your host, Roy Morejon, President of Enventys Partners, the top full service turnkey product development and crowdfunding marketing agency in the world. We have helped startups raise over 100 million dollars for our clients since 2010. Each week, I’ll interview a crowdfunding success story, an inspirational entrepreneur, or a business expert, in order to help you take your startup to the next level with crowdfunding. Roy Morejon: Art of the Kickstart is honored to be sponsored by BackerKit, and the Gadget Flow. BackerKit makes software that crowdfunding project creators use to survey backers, organize data, and manage orders for fulfillment, by automating your operations and helping you print and ship faster. The Gadget Flow is a product discovery platform that helps you discover, save, and buy awesome products. It is the ultimate buyer’s guide for cool luxury gadgets and creative gifts. Now, let’s get on with the show. Roy Morejon: Welcome to another edition of Art of the Kickstart. Today, I am joined with Desiree Haller, CEO, and I gave her the title of Chief Sub Organizer, with SubSafe. Desiree, thank you so much for joining us today. Desiree Haller: Oh, thank you Roy for having me. I’m very excited to be here. Roy Morejon: Yeah, really excited to have you on the show, I know we had Zorpads on a few weeks ago, and they shared the same episode on Shark Tank with you guys. You and your husband Adam went on the show in hopes of sharing a 13% of your company exchange, but ended up doing a deal with Mark Cuban, and Charles Barkley, where they gave you $100,000 for 25% of the company. So, I love this product, give us and the audience an idea of where did this idea come from? What inspired you to create SubSafe? Desiree Haller: Well, the husband and I are avid boaters, and even more specifically we do a lot of offshore fishing, and where we live, we spend the whole day, it takes about two hours just to get to the location. So it’s really an all day event, and I think like most men are kind of creatures of habit, my husband always did the same thing. He went to the sub shop, he got the sub, he put it in the cooler. And we would always return with half of a soggy mess, you know, the part that stayed in just those extra couple hours was just enough to throw it over and ruin it. Desiree Haller: So I was actually just, I had no intention of creating a product in the beginning, I was just trying to find something on the market, and it was just kind of one of those light bulb moments when I ...