'Shark Tank': Why did Kevin Hart ditch Barbara Corcoran to close $600K deal with The Transformation Factory?
The finale episode of 'Shark Tank' Season 13 kicked off with Alexiou Gibson, the founder of The Transformation Factory stepping into the tank to pitch for his sea moss gel. After explaining the many health benefits of consuming sea moss gel regularly, Alexiou asked the Sharks for an investment of $500,000 for a stake of 5% in his brand. Considering he had made over $3 million in sales and pocketed a cool $1.4 million in profits, the Sharks were immediately intrigued.
The first Shark to jump in with an offer was guest Shark, Kevin Hart. When Kevin O'Leary and Mark Cuban tried questioning why anybody would shell out a whopping $24 to buy a small jar of sea moss gel that resembled baby food. Luckily for Alexiou, Hart jumped in and revealed that sea moss gel is currently a huge rage amongst the African-American community, and that he had already tried the sea moss gel himself earlier. So, Kevin went ahead and made an initial offer of $500K for a 20% stake in the brand. Barbara chimed in and pointed out that she would be the perfect Shark to help the business scale up and that she too wanted 20% stake. Hart smartly decided to team up with Barbara and the two Sharks made a joint offer of investing $500K for a 20% stake which would be split into 10%each amongst the two Sharks.
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Wanting a piece of action himself, Mr Wonderful aka Kevin O'Leary too rolled out an offer of investing $500K but for 30% stake instead! Kevin's offer immediately made Hart and Barbara's joint offer a lot more appealing. But Alexiou felt that 20% equity was way too high to part with for just $500K, so he countered the offer by asking if the two Sharks would be willing to invest $800K instead for the 20% stake. Barbara immediately said no, and declared that the $500K investment sounded right for 20% equity. When Alexiou began looking a bit uncomfortable, Hart decided to bump up the investment amount to $600K. He checked with Barbara if she wanted to partner with him for the $600K investment deal. When Barbara said no, Mark jumped in.
Mark and Hart made their final offer of $600K for a 20% stake. Alexiou happily agreed and the trio closed the deal, while Barbara sat in disbelief over being excluded from the quick deal. An angry Barbara declared that Hart wasn't a 'cutie pie' anymore. But in the end, all the Sharks unanimously agreed that Hart and Mark closed the deal with a man they predicted would be very successful.
'Shark Tank' Season 13 is available for streaming on ABC. Missed an episode? Been wanting to catch up? Episodes can also be viewed the next day on demand and on Hulu. Not just that, you can also watch old seasons and episodes on Amazon Prime Video and iTunes.