‘Shark Tank’ review: Nuts N’ More, PsiBands, Black Magic IPL, JesKa Shoe Company

“Shark Tank” this week was in many ways all about big ideas. Two products featured here made some very enormous promises to help with everyday problems, but they also raised questions about what could be a market-changing innovation, and what could be an enormous liability to investors. They were risks that were simply not worth taking, especially when there are other established and safe options out there.

Away from these two products, we saw two other pitches that contained more standard fare for this show: a food product that could make health nuts jump up and down, and a customizable shoe brand that has some potential but also some flaws.

Nuts N’ More – Any time you hear the words “taking our nuts to the next level,” your mind is probably not going to the right place here. The product itself on paper is rather great: fortified peanut and almond butters that contain double protein, flax seed, and other nutrients to keep you healthy and fit.

For bodybuilders or even vegetarians looking for a great source of protein, we could see this being a great product; and while the price point (which is over $10 a jar) is high, it’s not that much higher than most other health products (and it will lower if they make more inventory). The only real issue we see is that these guys, despite only $100,000 in their pocket, have made the insane decision to price their business at $1.25 million. Most of the sharks simply couldn’t look past this when negotiating, but we did get into an interesting bidding war regarding Mark Cuban and Robert Herjavec. There was some smart negotiating here for both parties, and they orchestrated a great deal that will help everyone involved. We like the product and we like these guys, so we are very happy to see that they walked out of here with a smile on their faces.

PsiBands – We have to be honest: before the founder of business started to explain the product, we were skeptical that this product (which helps to in part heal nausea through acupressure) was something that could really work. It is FDA-cleared, and she does claim that there are studies that prove that it can work.

We really don’t want to get into whether or not this actually helps people or not, since we don’t have the sort of knowledge or experience to make a decision outside of explaining our skepticism. What we will talk about instead is the fact that it really did not feel like she wanted to make a deal so much as she wanted to be on the show to take that publicity and use that in order to sell more of the product. Sadly for her, she did not come across well. She was putting the business in debt to pay her own salary, and she refused to even negotiate with Kevin O’Leary, who seemed almost pleading with her to give him a counter. No one understandably bit on this, and in our opinion we wouldn’t, either.

Black Magic IPL – If this product legitimately worked as well as advertised, this could be absolutely brilliant if it had the full research and approval behind it: a device that could be used by people within the comfort of their own home in order to remove tattoos. Basically, it is a light treatment that the owners claim will not hurt you, and is reasonably easy for people to use.

Like with PsiBands, we can’t sit here and say right now whether or not the product is something that will be effective … or in this case even be safe. The biggest problem that we see with this is actually not so much safety, but just the fact that if we had a bad tattoo and wanted it removed, we would rather just spend the extra money to go to a professional tattoo shop than to try something on our own that we don’t know for sure will be effective.

JesKa Shoe Company – As we said in our preview article, this is a product that on the surface has promise: for women on the go, having a shoe that you can shift from a heel to a wedge is something that could be very useful. It’s certainly not for everyone, especially since there are many people out there who just like owning many pair of shows.

The problem that we have with this idea more than anything else is simply that these shoes cost too much: if you can afford to spend $200 on a pair of shoes, you’re going to buy two pairs of shoes. This would be a good idea for consumers in the $40-60 range, who can’t afford multiple pairs but want a nice look.

We will say that for a few minutes we actually liked the story being presented to the sharks here about the foundation of the company and Jessica getting the money from grandpa, but the moment she brought up her parents, this ventured too far into sob story territory for us. The lack of information and the price point would have caused us to go “out,” but amazingly Daymond John did throw her a life preserver … even if he did take 70% of the company in the process. This is actually a brilliant offer in that he’s going to work to make this successful, and she can use his knowledge to learn and grow.

What did you think about these products, and are there any that you would buy? Be sure to share your thoughts below, and you can check out some more highlights from this season of “Shark Tank” over at the link here.

Photo: ABC