Christopher Jane and Jennifer Jane, the brother and sister founding duo of specialty diet meal startup Proper Good Inc., had three costume ideas lined up for their appearance on ABC's "Shark Tank": proper superheroes, proper Victorians and proper grandmas.
"We were trying to kind of test all these different outfits, all these different ideas," Christopher said. "And the Victorian kind of approach just resonated more with everyone. ... So we've kind of really leaned into that. A couple of the producers of 'Shark Tank' were really fun people, and it went from sort of a loose idea to suddenly it's wigs and outfits and crown jewels and podiums and all the rest of it."
The costumes also went well with their English accents, which might have come as a surprise to viewers expecting Texas twang from the Austin-based founders.
The siblings appeared on the Oct. 15th episode of the show. Between the Victorian outfits and the appeal of their premium shelf-stable meals for folks adhering to keto, gluten- or dairy-free and plant-based diets, their pitch worked. After several sharks passed on the company, Proper Goods landed a tentative deal with Mark Cuban, who offered a $400,000 investment for a 20% stake in the company. (See the full episode on ABC.com.)
Even though that deal hasn't been inked yet, the startup is feeling the impact of being seen by around 4 million viewers.
"We had high hopes, but what I can say is it honestly eclipsed our all our expectations," he said. "We did probably between three and four months of our standard sales in about a week. And what was really nice is we're about three weeks after the show now and we're still seeing our daily business more than double what it was pre-'Shark Tank.'"
It could have been a disaster. With supply chain issues disrupting product flow globally, the company just barely got the increased meal shipments into their hands before the show aired and a huge wave of orders came through.
"The good news is 95% of our supply chain is U.S.-based, so we were able to rally everyone from the box manufacturers to the flyers to the stickers. We said, 'Look guys, we've got two weeks I know this is an unusual ask but we need to basically produce two months of inventory probably in the next two weeks.' So we were able to essentially load up I would say just in time, literally within 48 hours before the airing."
Proper Good only has four full-time employees, including Christopher, who is CEO, and Jennifer, who is chief marketing officer, with a few interns and part-time helpers.
The Jane siblings landed in Montana when they moved to the U.S. about a decade ago. They founded a spices and sauce business called Montana Mex, which struggled with brand awareness, before Christopher moved to California to get his MBA at Stanford where he started building the idea for Proper Good.
"We've worked together literary since we were probably 12 years old. We had a little T-shirt printing thing that we did in the garage and we organized local concerts and gigs and things like that. This is all in England, obviously," he said.
Christopher said he and his sister both complement each other with different skill sets: "She's 100% the creative and the strategist on the performance marketing, the brand and imagery side. And I'm very much the exact opposite of that. So, although we work 24/7 together, it's kind of nice delineation between the two roles."
The company had $556,000 in revenue in its first year in 2020. In the first half of 2021, it expected about $500,000. But with the "Shark Tank" bump, it now expects finish 2021 with more than $2 million in revenue.
That boost meant the company had to hustle.
"We didn't want to get 10,000 orders and then not be able to ship them for two months because that experience would just be horrendous," he said. "So we were very, very lucky, I would say, and very happy with our U.S. partners that we basically got lucky and managed to get all of the inventory pretty much built.
"I think we shipped about 90% of those orders from 'Shark Tank' within a week, which was obviously a great success for us."
Even though the "Shark Tank" funding isn't yet in hand, Proper Good is planning a big year ahead. It currently has 18 items, including soups, grains, chilies and its newly launched oatmeal line.
"But even today, the business is really about 98% direct to consumer, so we barely do any retail currently," he said. "So outside of wider meals, that next channel for us is really to move into some natural retail and some select tests and things like that in the in the next 12 months."
