‘Shark Tank’ review: Grace and Lace, PurseCase, Yubo, Chocomize, and a Drop Stop update

Tonight on “Shark Tank,” we had some success stories. We also had what may be our favorite offer in the entire history of the show, as one of the sharks decided that he was going to become the evil version of Willy Wonka (at least in jest).

If you’re new to our “Shark Tank” reviews, here is how the game goes: We give our own take on the product along with how it actually fares on the show, and then, we also give you links to check out all of the individual products. After all, don’t you deserve the right to have easy navigation to all of these? We like to make it a little bit easier on you.

Yubo – Everyone loves customization, right? This is a cool idea, mostly because you can get a lunchbox that lasts for a long time, mostly because you are giving the kid the opportunity to change things out and constantly have a lunchbox that suits their personal taste. Cool, and not overly expensive.

But, there are holes in this business. To invest in a product that already has equity out there, as well as a royalty, is so risky when you wonder whether or not the entrepreneur is going to have enough money to keep the business going. With the sales that they have, this is better off as a business that just benefits from the airtime on the show … or so we thought.Not only did they get a great deal, but they got two sharks. Sold to Kevin O’Leary and Robert Herjavec with a unique deal: They receive 20% of the business, but that goes down to 10% if they are paid back in a short amount of time.

PurseCase – The problem with this product is that it’s simply not as intuitive as they think that it is … but this was once again something that we were apparently wrong about. The big issue that we have with it is that we can’t really think of that many people who want to just go out with their phone, some cards, and nothing else. Isn’t this easy to forget somewhere? Maybe we’re not the market for it, since it will probably sell very well and Lori Greiner was in love with it. Lori invests $55,000 for 15% of the company.

Chocomize – We love the way that this guy says “sharks” first of all, and it turns out that some of the problems with this company were the same as what we teased in our preview. It looks tasty, and we’re sure that it would make a great gift purchase for someone. But, the problem here is that it’s a niche product for holidays and corporate events. It’s just not going to be something that blows up and gets huge, though we think the business will probably still do just fine based on what they did here. We at least get the greatest offer in the history of the show from Kevin O’Leary, who hilariously tried to steal the guy pitching the product to make Mr. Wonderful’s Chocolate Company. No deal.

Grace and Lace – Who knew that a set of socks would be so popular? They have incredible socks, they make a ton of money. As Robert Herjavec said, the proof is in the money! They have something that clearly works, and they are worthy of an offer or two. (We say that even as someone who would never buy the socks.)

This deal became very interesting when Robert offered them $175,000 for 10% of the business right away, which was exactly what they asked for, and he of course wanted them to take it right away, knowing that this keeps him with the upper hand. They didn’t take it, and they then lost him. They ended up getting the same deal with Barbara (with half of the money being a line of credit), but they are really lucky that they have a good product, given that they really didn’t handle this that well. Had she not been interested, they would have been headless chickens in there.

A quick note on the update tonight: The press release said that Tom + Chee was going to be featured, but instead it was Drop Stop. That’s a little bit of a bummer to us, mostly because we like to assume that press releases are actually supposed to be accurate to, you know, the press. Episode Grade: A-.

Did you want to buy any of these products? Be sure to share in the poll below, and click here if you want to read about some other highlights from this season.

Photo: ABC