Born to Fish Page 19

  This was the worst possible setup for Greg. He can be amazingly relaxed if he has to talk spontaneously at any kind of event or even on television or radio. He’s a natural performer. But if he has to spend hours—or in this case days—in anticipation, worrying about how something like this will turn out, it eats him up inside. Plus everything about Shark Tank is intentionally ominous and menacing. Even the opening credits are scary—tall skyscrapers viewed from below with silhouettes of hammerhead sharks swirling around above (with a nice shark bite out of the letter K in Tank) while music reminiscent of the theme from Jaws plays in the background. And the first things the contestants see when they enter the Shark Tank set are the stern faces of the Sharks peering intently at them, like predators viewing their next meal.

  The Sharks are a panel of potential investors who consider offers from aspiring entrepreneurs hoping to get someone to grubstake their product, invention, or business. The show seeks to capture “the drama of pitch meetings and the interaction between the entrepreneurs and tycoons.” Shark Tank plays up the tension to the hilt. It can be a humiliating experience for contestants, many of whom are teased and ridiculed by the Sharks. (The show actually requires each contestant to talk to a company psychiatrist before they leave the studio, to make sure they’re okay.) Greg was worried—it was one thing to go home empty-handed, but what if he disgraced himself in front of a national viewing audience, including virtually everyone he’d ever known?

  As soon as he heard from the producer, Greg telephoned his brother to let him know what was going on. Dave lives in Portland, Oregon, but he had come to Los Angeles to help Greg prepare for Shark Tank. He had already been helping him with his RattleSinker business and knew all the details. Dave told me he views himself as Greg’s consigliere, helping him make decisions, evaluating the different options he has to choose from.

  Dave was staying at another hotel near the airport. “I’d drive there in the morning, have a cup of coffee with him, and put him on the van,” he said. “Then I’d go somewhere and wait for him to call, to find out if he made it through the day okay. I’d go back up to his room at night and grill him: ‘What are you going to say if they say this?’ ‘What are you going to say if they say that?’ It was almost like a presidential debate prep. I think it helped, but he got so pissed off at me.”

  “After a while, I’m not listening to a thing he’s saying,” said Greg. “I’m just sitting there, and I’m like, ‘yeah, yeah, yeah.’ ”

  Eventually Dave came to realize they’d reached a point of diminishing returns and that this intense drilling was just making Greg more stressed, so he changed tactics. “You know, Greg, you got this far just doing this goofy shit, so you might as well just keep doing it,” Dave told him. “The thing is, you’re a fisherman, not a businessman; just be yourself and don’t worry about any of the commercial aspects or anything. These guys are going to see a business opportunity or not. If they don’t, you know what you’re doing tomorrow. So let’s just hang around L.A. this weekend and have a good time.”

  They drove to Venice Beach and walked around enjoying the warm California sun, and even went fishing at a nearby pier. Greg could feel the stress melting away. But it came back with a vengeance on Monday night, and he barely slept at all. He couldn’t eat any breakfast the next morning as he got ready for his day at the studio. Dave was standing with him when Greg boarded the Shark Tank van. He stood at attention and snapped a military salute at Greg as it drove away.

  Although he arrived at the studio before 9:00 a.m., Greg spent most of the day in his dressing room. It was a torturous experience. “I had no idea when it would be my turn,” said Greg. “I just sat there eating prednisone and Xanax to keep myself from freaking out.” The producers, Al and Mike, kept coming into Greg’s dressing room and asking him to go through his pitch again. He was so exhausted—and so sick of giving the pitch—he kept screwing it up. They were both aghast.

  “Look, I know I’ll do fine when I’m in there,” Greg told them. “Just leave me alone. I promise you I will not fuck up under pressure.” The two glanced at each other, a look of terror in their eyes.

  “I don’t know what they were thinking at that point,” said Greg. “They were like, ‘Oh my God!’ ” But they left him alone.

  He finally got the call at 6:00 p.m. telling him he was up next. He’d been alone in his dressing room since Al and Mike had left him that morning. “I was one of the last people to go,” said Greg. “They came to my dressing room and picked me up in a golf cart.” It was a scorching day, nearly 110 degrees Fahrenheit as he stepped out of his air-conditioned dressing room. They drove him to a huge studio building that resembled an airplane hangar. A production person met him at the door.

  “We’re going to bring you in, mike you up, and make sure all your stuff is set up the way you want it,” he told Greg. He followed the man inside to the Shark Tank set. A false wall that could be wheeled out had a mount of Greg’s world-record striped bass and certificates for each of his records, but they were covered by a tan nylon shroud attached to a fishing rod, so he could twitch it away and unveil them at the appropriate moment. A wooden table stood in front with displays of Greg’s RattleSinkers. To the right was a rack with several fishing rods and reels, and to the left, a sign with his World Record Striper Company logo in black on a white background.

  The Sharks were already sitting in there, but they didn’t pay attention to Greg. They were all looking at their iPhones, checking emails or sending tweets. The Sharks included Mark Cuban, a billionaire tech mogul and owner of the famed Dallas Mavericks basketball team; Lori Greiner, who holds over 100 patents and has launched some 400 products, grossing more than a billion dollars in sales; Daymond John, a branding expert behind multiple global brands, generating billions in sales; Kevin O’Leary, a shrewd venture capitalist nicknamed “Mr. Wonderful,” who made his fortune selling a children’s educational company for more than four billion dollars; and Robert Herjavec, who founded one of the world’s preeminent cyber security firms. Greg felt a chill when he saw them and looked away.

  He told the man that everything in his display looked great. After he was miked up, they took him to a waiting room where he sat on a couch for another small eternity. He knew he had to overcome his fears to avoid making a fool of himself. “Don’t be such a fucking pussy!” he shouted at himself. “They’re just people. Get your fucking self together, man!” Then he slapped himself hard in the face.

  The production man finally came back and told Greg he needed to take him to the entrance passage, where two huge doors are opened to let contestants enter the Shark Tank set.

  “So, you’re getting yourself psyched up, huh?” the man asked.

  “What do you mean?” said Greg.

  “We heard everything you were saying through your mike,” he said, laughing. Greg blanched. “Don’t worry about it. You’d be surprised at all the shit I hear.”

  Although on the show the two heavy doors appear to open automatically, actually two men in hardhats open them manually. Greg nodded at them as he stood waiting.

  “Are you union guys?” he asked. They both nodded.

  “Me, too,” he said. “I’m a union electrician.” They both fist-bumped with Greg.

  “Go in there and kill it, man,” one of them said.

  “I definitely will,” said Greg.

  * * *

  Into the Shark Tank

  As Greg stood there, waiting to make his entrance, a loudspeaker blared: “Next into the Tank is an entrepreneur who hopes to lure the Sharks with a big fish.” With that, the doors swung open and Greg strode onto the set, stopping at his mark on the floor. He looked every inch the fisherman, clad in a light blue nylon fishing shirt, tan pants, boat shoes, and a World Record Striper Company cap.

  The first half-minute or so of a Shark Tank segment is always an intense stare-off between the contestant and the Sharks—some smirking, others glaring menacingly. And it’s only the beginning of what
can be an excruciating experience for a contestant, far more stressful than it might appear to a television audience, because the final version of each segment is much shorter than the original taping. In Greg’s case, for example, the televised segment only lasts about seven minutes, but he actually spent close to an hour in the studio making his pitch to the Sharks. But Greg was absolutely ready. In the initial stare-off, he instantly locked eyes with Kevin O’Leary and maintained his gaze until O’Leary finally looked away. At that moment, Greg was in his element. Although he still had a raging fever and intense pain from his colitis flare-up, he barely noticed it. A sense of intense calm came over him and all of his fears vanished.

  “Hello, Sharks,” he said. “My name is Greg Myerson from Wallingford, Connecticut. My company is the World Record Striper Company, and I’m seeking $75,000 in exchange for 20 percent of my company.” He felt completely relaxed and confident for the first time in weeks.

  “Sharks, I’m a fisherman . . . a darn good one, because I know to catch big fish you have to use the right bait.”

  Mark Cuban smiled broadly, obviously enjoying Greg’s pitch.

  “So, if I’m fishing for a shark, I’m probably going to use something like this.” Greg reached behind the false wall of his display and pulled out his daughter’s pink Barbie fishing rod with a thick wad of cash tied to the end of the line. With a flick of his wrist, he cast it at Kevin O’Leary, sitting thirty feet away, landing it right in his lap. Everyone went Ohhh! in amazement.

  “I figured you could use some cash,” said Greg.

  O’Leary smirked disdainfully at the wad, which contained only one-dollar bills, and tossed it back. Greg ignored him and went on with his pitch. “When I’m fishing, I use my very own product: the Greg Myerson RattleSinker.” He then explained how his product attracted big fish by mimicking the sounds of their favorite prey. “You hear that?” he said as he vigorously shook the sinker. “To fish, that’s the sound of the dinner bell ringing.” He said the RattleSinker had made him one of the most famous fishermen in the world, and then he picked up a fishing rod that was attached to the tan-colored shroud on the wall behind him and pulled it down, revealing the mount of his world-record striped bass. It was spectacular.

  “You caught that?” said Cuban, amazed. “That could knock over your boat.”

  “Yes, I did.” Greg told them the striped bass world record was the most sought-after saltwater fishing record in America and that it had stood for twenty-nine years before he shattered it. He pointed at the framed world-record certificate from the International Game Fish Association. He said it took about an hour for him to reel in the fish. “I hope it doesn’t take me that long to net a deal with you.”

  Greg pulled out a flat display container of RattleSinkers and walked over to the Sharks, letting each of them take one out and examine it. They all started shaking them. Daymond John asked Greg if he caught the fish using a RattleSinker.

  “Yes, I did. And I’ve caught three other world records with this product.” When the Sharks asked why the striped bass world record was so sought after, Greg told them the striped bass was “America’s fish.” Anyone can fish for it, without a yacht or expensive equipment. “You can fish from shore,” he said. Lori Greiner nodded enthusiastically and said how popular the striped bass is at Martha’s Vineyard, where she goes every summer. But she wondered why the RattleSinker is so effective at catching big fish.

  “It’s a good question,” said Greg, and then he gave a rambling reply that didn’t exactly answer her question but was entertaining. “I’ve been a fisherman my whole life. I started fishing at age two in a sewer and . . . probably a good thing I never caught anything there.” Daymond John looked skeptical as Greg spoke. “But at eight I made a fly out of my grandmother’s parrot . . . and I hated that thing. It would attack me.” Mark Cuban and a couple of other sharks laughed. “When it died, she said, ‘Would you bury it for me?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’ I tied twelve flies out of it. I caught a trout. It got me on the front page of the town newspaper.”

  “Oh, you are the man,” said Cuban, laughing while Kevin O’Leary looked dead serious.

  “When I came up with this product, I knew that these fish are sound-driven. They hunt through sound and vibration first. They’re also nearsighted.”

  O’Leary shook the sinker near his ear, with the same stern expression on his face. Cuban inquired why, if this product is so good, no one else had thought of it before.

  “Nobody’s as smart as me,” said Greg.

  Cuban laughed. “I like your humble humble-brag,” he said.

  The Sharks soon got down to business, bombarding Greg with questions about how he developed the RattleSinker, how and where he was selling them, how many he had sold, and how much profit he made from each one. He admitted he’d only sold about seven thousand so far. They looked incredulous. Greg told them he’d been selling RattleSinkers only since he broke the world record, but they had been his secret weapon for years. He’d earned about $55,000 so far selling them.

  “So you’re not the smartest guy in the world,” said Cuban.

  Greg shrugged. “I’m not a great businessman, but I’m a great fisherman.”

  “That’s pretty obvious,” said Cuban.

  He said Greg was not really an entrepreneur but a “wantrepreneur” and still trying to figure out what he was doing.

  Greg took the teasing from the Sharks in stride and had no qualms about going on the counterattack, giving as good—or better—than what they threw at him. He had one of his best exchanges with Daymond John. The producers, Mike and Al, had told Greg that Daymond John was an avid fisherman, and they had a picture of him holding up a pathetically small fish he had caught. They said if a moment came up in the taping where Greg could mention the photo, they would put it up on the screen and get a laugh. The opportunity came about three-quarters of the way through the taping when John said, “Let a fellow fisherman tell you, you better take this,” and Greg pounced. “Yeah, I know you’re a fisherman,” he said. “I’ve seen a picture of a fish you recently caught.” And the image popped up on the big screen.

  “Come on, man!” Greg teased. “That thing isn’t even big enough to be my bait!” All of the Sharks except Daymond John burst out laughing. John pointed out it was big enough for a sandwich. “Not for any of the sandwiches I eat,” said Greg.

  Another funny moment came when Greg mentioned a new film that would be coming out soon titled Running the Coast, produced by Jamie Howard of Howard Films, about East Coast anglers’ obsession with striped bass. Naturally, Greg figured prominently in the film, and Cuban teased him about it, calling him a movie star.

  “He asked me who was going to play me in the movie,” Greg told me. “ ‘Brad Pitt!’ I said. ‘Who else would play me? But who’s going to play you, Mark?’ The Sharks started throwing out names of actors, and they were all ugly. All of them were laughing and teasing each other.”

  At one point near the end of the taping, Robert Herjavec decided to drop out of the bidding for the RattleSinker, saying, “I’ll make this real easy. I’m out.”

  “Then you’re dead to me,” said Greg, and he wouldn’t even look at Herjavec anymore. “I held up my hand and blocked him out of my view,” he said later. “I would just look at the other four. They were all laughing. They loved it.”

  Greg thrived on the back-and-forth banter. Unfortunately, these and several other of his favorite moments in his pitch failed to make the final cut and did not appear on Shark Tank. But what did appear was great and gave his budding company a huge boost. Greg’s segment built quickly to a climax after Mark Cuban put an offer on the table.

  “I’m going to simplify things,” said Cuban. “I invested in a company named Shell Bobber, and I’m going to make you exactly the same offer I made to them: $80,000 for 33 percent.”

  Greg thought the offer sounded good, but he was curious if any of the other Sharks had counteroffers. Robert Herjavec, Lori Greiner,
and Daymond John had quickly dropped out, leaving only Mark Cuban and Kevin O’Leary in contention for a share in Greg’s company. O’Leary implied that he could do better for him, but Cuban cut him off before he could spell out his offer.

  “We all know what Kevin . . . the kind of offers he makes, right?” said Cuban. “So I’m going to put you on the spot. If you want to listen to Kevin, that’s fine. I’m out.” The camera zoomed in on Greg as he grimaced. “If you don’t want to listen to Kevin and take my offer . . .”

  “Well, that’s interesting,” O’Leary interjected. “Because my offer might be much better.”

  Then the Sharks raised the tension to the boiling point, talking rapidly over each other, building up to a stressful cacophony as the camera swirled around them: “Make up your mind!” “You’ve got to decide!” “You better take this offer!” “The money is on the table!” “What are you going to do?”

  “Dun-dun-dun-dun,” Robert Herjavec mimicked the sound that plays whenever the great white shark is about to appear in Jaws. Mark Cuban smiled. They all stared hard at Greg, and he stared right back.

  After a long, intense pause: “Mark, I’ll take the deal,” said Greg.

  “You got it,” said Cuban, getting up from his chair and walking to Greg.

  “Thank you, man,” Greg said as they shook hands. Then they hugged. “One world champ to another,” Greg added.