Watch the video version of this episode on YouTube - https://youtu.be/d3Cqr8EBlgg

David Restiano teamed up with Dan Staats, and together they invented Sorsoap. This innovative muscle recovery product propelled them to a spot on Shark Tank and a deal with Mark Cuban. Join as we discuss their amazing entrepreneurial journey. 

Website: https://www.sorsoap.com 
Instagram: @sorxsoap 
X: @sorxsoap 
Facebook: @sorxsoap

Transcript

Voiceover: So you're a PT or PTA grad who's feeling the spark of something more. Maybe you dream of building your own business, one that's constructed around your vision, one that empowers you to make a real difference on your terms. This feeling, it's the entrepreneurial itch. And you're not alone. Countless PTs and PTAs are taking the leap to entrepreneurship, crafting careers that are as unique as they are. 

Welcome to the Innovate and Rehabilitate the Entrepreneurial PT podcast. In each episode, we'll dive deep into the world of PT-preneurship with Inspiring physical therapists and physical therapist assistants just like you, who are crushing it on their terms. We'll uncover their secrets, their struggles, and the incredible impact they're making. From building your PT boss dreams to navigating the business side of things, will equip you with the knowledge and inspiration to turn your vision into reality.

So, whether you're just curious about starting your own business, or you're already out there making your dreams a reality, this podcast is for you. Get ready to unleash your inner entrepreneur. Let's do this!

Scott Giles (SG): Hello and welcome! I'm Scott Giles, founder of Scorebuilders, and I'll be your host for this podcast. Today's guests are Dr. Dan Staats and David Restiano. It all started with sore muscles, a shower and a sudden spark of inspiration. David Restiano, an active athlete and graphic designer, was dealing with stubborn hip flexor pain. A physical therapy session with Doctor Dan Staats introduced him to muscle scraping and the relief was immediate.

Later that day, while showering and eyeing a curved bar of soap, David had an idea. What if you could scrape your muscles and get clean at the same time? David teamed up with Dr. Staats, and together they refined the product into a simple, safe, and effective tool for recovery. The collaboration led them all the way to Shark Tank, where one quick demo landed them a deal with Mark Cuban.

Whether you're an athlete, a weekend warrior, or just want to feel your best, this podcast dives into the story, science and inspiration behind Sorsoap. So gentlemen, thanks so much for taking the time out of your busy days to join us today on this podcast. Your story is going to resonate with a lot of people, and it's going to get people excited, to say the least.

David Restiano (DR): Thank you, Scott.

Dan Staats (DS): Thanks for having us.

SG: Yeah, absolutely. It is truly inspiring. All right, so  So let's get right into it. If you guys could both just give me a just a brief breakdown of your work experience because, you know, obviously, we know Dan's a PT and and David’s a graphic designer, but just give us a little bit about your background and skillset.

DR: So, Dan's a doctor. I thought I wanted to be a doctor. I was a pre-med major on a biology track, at Marist University. And I was playing Division one soccer back in the 90s. And, I realized in about 2 or 3 weeks, it was just too much. I couldn’t do it all and I didn't want my grades to suffer.

So I checked with my advisor and I said, can they take my scholarship away if I change my major? Long story short, they didn't. And I changed my major from biology to painting and drawing. And I've been a graphic designer for the last 28 years. And, I've enjoyed my career. I've enjoyed creating things and all those kind of things, we'll talk about it later, but it kind of all came back together and coalesced with this company. So, you know, it was nice to pull it all together that way.

SG: And, David, you worked with some amazing companies, too. I mean, obviously Fortune 500 companies. I mean, your background was impressive. Dan, how about you?

DS: So I, being an athlete myself, I always kind of found myself in the trainer's room and started to grow a love for the health field. Started PT school, graduate PT school, and then, opened up my own practice. From there, I went on to get a bunch of specialist certifications for orthopedic clinical specialist, dry needling, ultrasound imaging, all these, you know, credentials over the years.

And, naturally, I started using muscle scraping or however you want to call it, hoc grips or graston, people use it sometimes. But yeah, so I am a very black and white analytical person, and I need to see evidence behind all the modalities I do in my office. So muscle scraping’s got great evidence behind it. And, yeah. So that led me to David and David led me to Sorsoap.

SG: Dan, How long after you graduated from school until you opened your own clinical practice?

DS: I worked for the man for about 2.5-3 years. I worked for big corporate PT, and I really just couldn't do it. I had like, bosses upon bosses, upon bosses upon bosses and and I just, you know, got tired of making money for the tier of bosses in the corporate PT world. So I made the entrepreneurial jump in 2008. So about, three years I practiced corporate PT and got a nice taste of what's not for me.

SG: Yeah, good for you. Not surprising right. But that is a very, with the people we've had on the podcast so far, that that's like the third or fourth time I've heard that exact story. You know, “within a short period of time, I just realized I cannot take it”. Or we had one individual looking for a completely different field of study, like, you know, what else can I do, this can't be it. And it I mean, honestly, it ended up working out great. But good for you for taking that step. So you are already an entrepreneur before this thing kicked off.

All right, so it sounds like you are kind of, David's, concierge PT to some extent before this. You guys had a relationship, used muscle scraping on David, and then, as we said, David takes a shower, obviously. And I love too, by the way, Dan, how you said, like, I'm very organized, analytical, and David's a graphic designer and creative and, you know, so I'm loving the blending, like, of the skill sets, because you guys clearly are bringing some different things to the table. But, David, take us through your shower experience…not too much detail, but take us through the shower experience, and then after that I want to pivot to you Dan because I want to hear, like, if your patient comes back and is like, hey, I think it was soap. Like, I just I want to hear how this concept went down. So go ahead David, kick us off.

DR: So once you hear, you know, we had more than just a doctor-patient relationship. We got to be friendly, I would say. With the amount of injuries I had and the amount of, you know, care that he gave me, we started in just with, I'm a little gregarious. I'm very outgoing person. I like to make connections. And you'll see how that's kind of given us, yielded some great results as we started the company.

I'm big on making connections with people. I was always I was brought up just to see the good in people and make and be creative about things. And that includes relationships. And it's provided a lot of benefit for us over the last few years since we teamed up. But to get back to your question, I came home from, you know, a traditional muscle scraping session on my hip flexor that Dan, you know, provided.

And it gave me great relief. The way my mind works, I came home, I jumped in the shower, and I wanted to wash off. You know, he'll tell the story that he didn't do a good job washing it off. He did a good job, washing it off, but it was still a feeling like I just needed to jump in the shower and get, you know, get everything done, get all cleaned.

And when I looked, I looked over and my wife had just put a brand new bar of Irish Spring in the soap dish, and it had that, just a little bit of a hallmark curve on the bottom. And it immediately put me in mind of some of the stainless steel tools that Dan was using. So the way my brain works, I grabbed it, I started scraping my bad hip flexor, then I started scraping my good hip flexor.

Then I started scraping my calves, my IT band, my Achilles. I said, this feels amazing. And I said, if I could figure out a way to make this out of the best possible soap with the best possible lineup of ingredients, that could maybe have a twofold effect. You know, be anti-inflammatory, be a little bit of analgesic built into the formula.

And immediately I thought CBD and menthol and lavender and all these great things that Dan and I then refined. But as I scraped my muscles, I had this eureka moment that you'll hear, you know, from, from a lot of different people. And I jumped out. I ran out into my office and I started sketching, you know, this pretty close to this trademark, this shape, you know, and I kind of it started to go a little, you know, snowball out of control in my mind.

And I said, all right, let me slow down. I think we're onto something here. Seems a little crazy, but I'm gonna run it by Dan. So a few days later, right. I, I tried to assemble my thoughts, you know, and put it into a way. And I just kind of just dropped it on him. I said, Dan, I got this crazy idea, I think I think it might work. I think it definitely helped me feel better. I think we could build a business around it. And that was really the way it kind of came together pretty quickly, too.

SG: That's amazingly quick. But okay, Dan, take us through. So you get this dropped on you and you're I mean, were you taking this to be like a little fun pet project…maybe we'll explore this? I mean, what were you thinking?

DS: I mean, I definitely loved the idea. I was like, wow, you got something here. Because the trend of muscle scraping was like, kind of it was clinician, but it was becoming laymen at the time. And it still is. You know, it's becoming, at that time serious athletes were starting the muscle scraping, now the layman.

So I was like, all right, we're kind of doing this and combining soap was like, for all those people that were like, I'll screw it up. I'm not going to muscle scrape. I'm just an everyday person like, well, you can't screw up soap. Everybody knows how to shower and bathe. So I thought we thought it was less intimidating and more accepting and, yeah.

So the other part that I loved was, you know, I have a hard enough time getting my patients to do their home exercise program. Now I'm just swapping out their bar of soap, and now they're at least doing something in a healthy manner rather than, you know. Scott, I'm sure your patients over the years, like it's just them sitting, they sit too long, they're not doing and but they're going to shower. Right? So now they're going to the shower in the healthiest way possible.

SG: Makes complete sense. So all right, David, you said you sketched out kind of a concept and obviously you guys had discussions about that. But look, I mean, did anyone have experience making soap or like, I mean, how did you guys go about that process? Because my understanding is you guys ended up doing this yourself as opposed to like going to some supplier. So talk to me about the learning curve. Even getting beta, you know, something to react to.

DR: So I made some sketches, made some 3D renderings, like so we had a basic, you know, a concept, a real rough concept for what we thought would work. We took a very simple grasp and, you know, type handled tool, and we just extruded the edges.

And I thought, all right, we can make a silicone mold. And we could, you know, we could fill it with soap. And why wouldn't it work? Right. Like you get in this entrepreneurial mindset that, and this is quoting, a woman named Marie Forleo, she has this quote of a book that she wrote. “Everything is figure out-able.” And it's a great approach when you're an entrepreneur because you have to figure everything out eventually. We took each gate as it came. We could fast forward, you know, we had some people help us make a silicone mold that I reached out to through a network that I've, you know, tried to tend to over the years, I thought about it through my mental Rolodex. I said, I know somebody who can make us a silicone mold.

So we had the silicone mold made, and Dan took it and ran with it. He taught himself how to make soap. You know, there's cold process. There's hot process. It's a process either way. And it's not as simple as it as it as it might seem to everybody out there in podcast land. Dan was the right person for it because he's the scientific brain. He's the organized one. He's on top of the numbers for our company. He was on top of the numbers for how much to put in the soap, how much. And he'll tell you the story. But it was a fun, it was an exciting process, let's put it that way.

But he was able to…oh, you know what, I have the mold right here. Actually, this is one of the original molds that we have here. And I have the actual prototype downstairs. But it was…I'll let Dan tell the rest of the story. It was pretty exciting.

SG: So, Dan, I'm picturing you in your kitchen with an apron and a big, you know, like, what's going on here? How did that go?

DS: So, yeah, I went online and I studied all the different processes of making soap. I went on Brambleberry.com, and I got a soap 101 making kit, and I just started to read about it. And when you make soap, there's this, like, caustic, byproduct called lye. You can't inhale it. You can't ingest it, you can't touch it.

So I had to dress up in this like ghost busters, like, you know, Breaking Bad outfit. And I had to kick my wife and my kids out of the house…like dad's making soap today. Get out of the house, you know? It probably looked like this crazy crystal meth, Breaking Bad scene. So all these chemical equations and things, it was a little nerve racking. But yeah, I would pour the soap into that mold that David has there. And then there was this anxious time of like, you know, I'm trying to, like, chisel it out and get the soap out, but I don't want it to break, but I wanted to pull hard enough. And. Yeah. So there were some ugly prototypes in the beginning.

SG:  Now, clearly how long did it take to go from dabbling to having, like, a minimally viable product?

DS: I think it was about a couple months of dabbling before we said, all right, let's bring this to the soap manufacturers and just see, like maybe they'll say, no you guys are idiots. You can't make this work. And, you know, a lot of it was playing with the ingredients, like first couple ones had too much menthol, and we were like, oooo, you know, this is typical here. Like, you know, well hold on, still like, still tingling when you go outside two hours later. So we had to play.

SG: And then you got it down? You must have had, so then probably you had family and friends test or you know, maybe even patients within your clinic. Just you pass out goodies?

DR: Well, then we went we then we signed on with, a soap company. So we tried to go with the bigger boys, but the big soap companies, but their minimum quantity order was so large, they wanted, like 30,000. We could barely afford 30 at the time. A CEO from one of large companies was nice enough to steer us to this gentleman. Jim McMahon, out in, Omaha, Nebraska. So Omaha soaps, he's a small market soap guy. Perfect for us. He was willing to take a chance on us. And, we got the brass stamp made out in England, I believe. England or Germany and England and, yeah, that then it came back and it's, you know, we've been working with him ever since.

SG: And still working with that same vendor today?

DR: Yep.

SG: Yeah. Wonderful. I love to see that people take a chance on someone like that. You know, do something small and then it evolves into something much bigger for both of you. That's fantastic. So at this point, then, so what kind of feedback did you get and how happy were you with what came back?

DR: I started giving it away to everybody. Scott. I mean, if we weren't ready to really build a sales infrastructure at this point because like you said, we had a minimum viable product, but we needed to really make sure we had market fit, you know, product market fit. And those are, you know, two of the real basic, essential, you know, building blocks of launching a company, right?

So I started giving it to my friends in the soccer, you know, world, which it got all the way up to the New York Red Bulls. In fact, from the MLS, we had probably 12 to 15 of the starting core group of guys from the MLS, you know, top tier team using it, and giving us feedback.

And then, you know, we were just giving it to anybody who was interested. Family, friends, athletes. My network of athletes in New Jersey, and from college was still pretty vibrant. I was still playing with some younger guys at the time, so I was just giving it to them and getting their feedback, you know, and it gave us enough of a direction and the anecdotal feedback that we were getting was allowing us to just make small little tweaks, always trying to make the bar harder while balancing the oils.

You know basically the soap process is it's fats and oils is really at the core of it. And if you have too much of one and not enough, the other than the bar gets soft. So, really part and parcel to Sorsoap’s efficacy is the muscle scraping.

And I love telling the story to people in person in pop ups. There’s people that know what muscle scraping is and there are people that don't. So when Dan and I are at pop ups, either together or separately, it's always a welcoming challenge, a small challenge with a small c, when somebody comes up and says, hey, what is this all about?

You know, and you say, well, it's a muscle scraping bar of soap and it's got great ingredients in it. And you just take it and you scrape your whole body from head to toe, and it increases blood flow and it makes you feel better. And you can either see that light bulb goes off in their eyes or they'll ask another question, well, how does that is it the formula or is it the actual, you know, hardness of the bar?

And I always tell them it's both. It's what's in the soap is great for your skin and it's anti-inflammatory and it's aroma therapeutic. But it's actually probably, I would say 85 to 90% of the weight of the modality is carried through the hardness of the bar. You could take all the other great ingredients out and make it, you know, not as great of a bar of soap that we took our time to create, and it would still give you some relief and help you manage some of those soreness especially, you know, after working out or after a run, it would still help you feel better, but we were able to combine it through a lot of feedback and working with Jim and Dan taking the lead, we were able to find that perfect balance of the formula and the function, and it was really rewarding. And it kind of that's when it all kind of clicked in. And that's when we started selling it.

We had enough feedback and I might have pushed the issue a little bit. You know, Dan, the analytical doctor in him wanted more feedback and more feedback. I said, I think we could go to market. I think we're ready. And sometimes, as you know, as an entrepreneur, you got to listen to that little voice in the back of your head and that little feeling in your stomach, that gut feeling. And it just seemed like it was the right time. So that's when we kind of launched it out there.

SG: And I'm guessing David, you know, at this time as well, I bet you already had the branding ready to go in the packaging and, you know, started to work on all the peripheral things like that.

DR: Yeah, we were just keeping it together and trying to bring it up step by step, you know, and, you know, as, as we had more opportunities and as more people saw what we were doing, we would, you know, kind of just meet behind the scenes, Dan and I. And what do we need? Do we need better packaging? Do we need better ingredients label? And we were lucky enough to have that infrastructure and the supply chain with a small American company that we were able to be pretty reactive and pretty flexible and nimble. You know, it really all kind of worked out, you know, at the time, you don't always think it's the best combination. And you might question some of the decisions that we've made, but it really all worked out and it led us led us in the right direction.

SG: So then once you started selling how did you guys determine your price point? How did you decide if we're just going direct to consumer? If we're trying to get in with local businesses? Or Dan, maybe you want to put together something that for your fellow friends who own clinics or whatever it may be, of an opportunity to sell it, you know, check out to a customer? How do you guys address that and what were early sales like?

DR: Go ahead, Dan.

DS: Yeah. So I think with the price point we kind of worked backwards. We went with like, well, how much does it cost us and how much is it going to cost us to ship. And then everything, not just the soap but landed, getting it here, we put a little sticker on it. You know, we had to account for that.

And then we started selling, the suction cup holder you talked about briefly when we gave them out to friends and family. In the beginning, the suction cup holder was kind of feedback from that, and we kind of knew it. We had to make something. In the beginning we just kind of resting the bar on, like those pump shampoo pump holders, you know, because we realized the bar has to be dried thoroughly throughout to get the maximum benefit.

So when we're doing all of this A/B testing, that's kind of some of the feedback we got. The size of soap bag that you see on our website too. That exfoliant bag. That was because when the bar got really small after 18-20 uses, it was such a good soap. We had such good ingredients in here that we, you know, we still wanted to use it.

So we thought, all right, let's get this bag. That way we use the soap all the way through, beginning to end. I told David in the beginning, I kind of liked it when my soap broke, you know. Usually it should be a sad day, like, oh, my soap broke. But really I was like, yes, I get to put soap in my bag, you know! And now I have this cycle of like, I go from one to the other.

In terms of pricing, we worked backwards. We were in this mindset. You know, we really just want to put this out there. And we're not as money hungry as you would think. We're really just our goal is to make people healthier and better. And we always talk about margins. And I feel like we're always like, let's make it in the sweet spot so that the customers like, oh, yeah, no problem. Like, I'll take care of that. And that's one thing we struggle with is we're trying to get our margins down. But it's difficult, takes a lot of manpower to make our bar soap. So it costs us a decent amount. So we're still in that, ballpark a little bit, but, yeah, we just kind of work backwards, and we're happy with a modest margin on our end and try to give most of the savings to the customer.

SG: Yeah, it's tough with a premium product like that because, you know, you could cut a lot of corners and produce, you know, bars for far lower. But that's not the therapeutic, you know that you guys are going for. So what kind of marketing like? Was there was this like a guerrilla marketing campaign, grassroots social media? What kind of things did you folks use to get that off the ground?

DR: Well, that’s, I think I'll handle this one right. I did everything we could, right? We thought about every different way we could do it. What worked, what didn't work, what sticks, what doesn't stick? The greatest, I have to say, the best thing about my background and Dan's background. They're both so applicable to what we're doing, right. Dan, as a clinician, Dan is helping people feel better on a daily basis. I've caught that bug. And the best feeling for me is when I get an email or text, Scott that somebody says, you know, your bar helped me fix my shin splints or help manage my shin splints, pain. And I've been able to run more and I've lost 25 pounds. That's something I never even envisioned, right?

But to answer your question, we both have these skill sets. My skill set was graphic design, social media, you know, so I was able to just crank out every sort of collateral marketing piece that you could think of. We would test funny ads. We would test serious ads. We'd get out. Finally, I got out in front of the camera and I really have become, you know, Dan will probably attest to this, I've become the face of our brand in a fun way, in an engaging way, and an authentic, genuine way. And it wasn't always in my comfort zone, but it really has become something that I enjoy, I look forward to. And we've proven that it's become effective because, as we'll get into later on in this interview, you know, some big things came about through social media.

And I've always been proud of the fact that Dan and I have, you know, we're kind of like the yin and the yang. We've complete each other in a business kind of sense. You know, everything that he's good at, I'm not so good at and everything that he's a little, you know, a little nervous about trying or taking on, that's my sweet spot. So you can't always pick your partner. But I know at the end of the day that we're so appreciative of each other. And we've got some big things coming up this month. And it makes it so easy that we know, he can handle his lane. I can handle my lane. And there's a nice amount of overlap when we sit and talk with one another, but it really is. It's a comfort to know that we can both kind of flex our muscles in what we're good and comfortable at. And it's working.

SG: Yeah, clearly it is. I see you two, that I mean you know the limited information I have or what I've drawn, just your backgrounds are so synergistic it makes sense. And the other thing I like is that you guys had an existing relationship prior to this. I mean, David, there's no way you're going to Dan and say, you know, to approach him on a business idea unless you had kind of thought through, you know, can I work with this guy? Is he a good human being? Do his skills complement mine?

I love also how much of the kind of data gathering you guys have done in terms of the product and how it's refined, whether it's into additional product line pieces or whether it's just, you know, making a better widget. Right? I mean, all the additions that you talked about. It's clear that you guys are doing this for the right reasons and that you're passionate about making your product, you know, as positive of an experience as it can be for everyone.

All right. So then how does how does Shark Tank come about. Because that's unbelievable right? That's next level in terms of, you know, moving from mom and pop into something very, very different.

DR: Yeah. So I'll start Dan but you can jump in, you know. We were lucky enough to, a lot of its timing. You know, we were talking about another podcast, another entrepreneurial podcast before. And, you know, Guy Raz always ends his podcast by saying, “do you think it was luck or hard work?”  So it makes me think of this. We did so much hard work. We never shied away from doing the hard stuff. You know whether it was making soap or creating social media or getting in front of the camera. But there was a little luck involved too, because at the time that we were doing this, TikTok, you know, blew up and there was a component of TikTok that really benefited us was there was a TikTok Shop launched.

So a lot of businesses got on TikTok at a certain juncture, probably two and a half, three years ago, and they just put a lot of momentum behind it, a lot of energy behind these 10 or 20 companies, and we happen to be one of them. We benefited from the ride, so to speak, that they pushed, they gave this rocket ship kind of energy behind a few of the companies that merited it, and we were one of them.

So we went from, you know, every day, I would say, Dan, we got another 2000 followers or we got another 4000 followers, we're up to 5000 followers. Then all of a sudden we were up to 80,000 followers on TikTok, Scott. And that became a very powerful source of not only traction, visibility, but business.

To answer specifically how I think TikTok helped us get on Shark Tank, somebody reached out to me, an ultramarathoner from California. Great guy. Had posted something about an injury, and I responded to him and I said, you know, hey, Andy, you know, I think you could benefit from this tool. And it wasn't a product that we created. It was another competing, I would say, competing product. So anyway, a producer from Shark Tank saw that interchange, that exchange between Andy and I. And it kind of caught his attention. And he said, you know, just the fact that a CEO of a wellness company suggested using a quote unquote competitor's product to an athlete, it caught my eye. And I looked further into you and Dan, and I saw the kind of people you were, the family, you know, familymen, husbands, fathers, you know, the authentic face that you put out on social media. And it really it's something that we wanted and that's, long story short, that's really how we got on Shark Tank. They saw us, they saw me, they saw Dan, and they liked what we were doing. They liked what the product was all about. They thought it was a unique enough approach that it would make, you know, a compelling pitch on Shark Tank.

And, you know, a few conversations later, I called Dan. I had a phone conversation with a producer. I called Dan, said, Dan, you're not going to believe it. I said, I think we got a good chance of being on Shark Tank. And he was like, you're right. I can't believe it. This is amazing. You know that being on Shark Tank, for me and I would say, Dan and for any other entrepreneur out in this country and even Canada, it's the brass ring.

When you think of the ultimate experience as an entrepreneur or a startup or a founder, you think if I can get just get on Shark Tank, you know, we've got a big chance to make this splash and to make this really stick? So, yeah, we were we were blown away.

SG: Now that's thrilling. And Dan, and for both of you, I'm sure, David, you probably have a similar example, but I'm just thinking of, you know, like, hey, all the kids out of the house today, dad’s making soap and then being able to come and tell your kids, hey, fam, guess what? Guess who's going to be on Shark Tank? And I mean, yeah, the level of pride and just like, what a great lesson, right? I mean, for your family for like, I don't know, I just think that that moment. Dan, tell us about that moment when you dropped that on your family.

DS: So it's funny you said it because David told me in like, March. We had to make all the cuts and, and really, at that time, I just told my wife. And even when they said we're going to be on, they were like, you can tell your immediate family, but they didn't want you really to tell anybody else. Right? But they have to be able to keep the secret. Well, I have two teenage girls that think they're cooler than everybody, and they would definitely walk into school the next day and be like, guess what? My dad's going to be on Shark Tank. So really, just my wife knew for a while, I think I told my brother, but that was it. I didn't tell really that my brother and my wife until we aired and got and came back and got to deal with Mark. That's when I really told everyone. I really floored my family and friends because they were like, you know, because, you know, really, I didn't want to come back and be like, we went out there, but we didn't get a deal. You know? At least I came back and had good news for for everybody.

But yeah, keeping the secret was the really hard part. I'd be stretching people

SG: What was the time like, from recording to when it actually aired? Because you still had to keep the secret at that point. Right?

DS: Yeah, it was me. I mean, it was long.

SG: Like you guys knew you had a deal, but you could not share that with others, right? Until it actually aired. Do you remember the timeframe on that?

SG: We probably had the handshake deal with Mark in June, and it didn't air until the following April. June or July

SG: Yeah, that's right because I told you guys earlier, my sister was also on Shark Tank and in a similar similar product type category. And unfortunately she did not get a deal. But it was still an incredible experience. So we kind of got the all the backstage like this is what happens. It's such a bigger process than anyone ever realizes in terms of putting it together. And by the way, you guys killed it on your pitch like you were so comfortable. There was no trepidation. And both of you just deliver.

It was funny, but I'll be honest with you, when I was watching it, like, I didn't see it. And I do watch Shark Tank very regularly, but it's the type of thing where I just like, I'm flipping through and I'll see it, and I always stop. But it's not like I'm watched every episode from every season. So I knew what happened because one of our instructors, had watched it and saw you guys and was like, you got to get these guys on the on the podcast. So even though I knew what happened, tell us about how it went, because I was worried you weren't going to get a deal. You had what? Barbara. You had Robert. Obviously had Mark. Laurie, who I thought was going to for sure. So after the first couple people went out, I think maybe Robert might have gone. Oh, no. Mr. Wonderful went out first. And then I don't remember who it was. But when Laurie went out, I was like, oh, no, because I saw that working. So what were you guys thinking? I mean, you must have, I don't know, I would have been inside just going crazy as each person is kind of giving you a lot of positive stuff, but just maybe not for me or I have a competing business or whatever. Tell us about that experience of being there live and having that go down.

DR: So, Scott, you know, having your sister been a part of the show, you know, there's a lot of sensitivity around when once you're a contestant on the show or, you know, you have to respect the process a bit. Right. But what we can say is while we were there, it was amazing from start to finish, the staff, the sharks themselves, the production company, everybody involved with the show is just so top notch, you know, class A. It was a great experience.

Now, you said we didn't look nervous. We were so calm and collected. I could be honest with you. We were nervous. We rehearsed. We were ready. We rehearsed a lot, you know, and we pushed each other to make sure you know it and make sure, you know, keep me accountable, I’ll keep you accountable. So we did nail the pitch. But while we were up there, you know, there's a lot that gets edited down. And you could imagine there was a lot of conversations happening. There was a lot of overlap. If you've seen the show, obviously you have those sharks. They want to get their points and they want to get their questions answered. And at one point, I think I just kind of tugged on Dan's shirt and I was like, dude, I need a second. Like, I need to process this stuff. Like, this is the biggest moment, you know, business wise of our lives. We need to make sure, you know, we were answering the right questions and we're giving we're giving the best that we have to offer.

So you're right. It happened the way, you know, it was quick. It was quick succession. Mr. Wonderful was out because he said he had a competing, you know, product. It was really a detergent company. Dan and I both, I could tell, Dan said he was like, this has nothing to do with detergent, but okay, you still got four sharks.

Then Maury and Barbara, the sweetest women in the world will be will be customers. We love you. We love what you're doing, but we're out. Now, I'm starting to sweat. You know, the lights are hot, but I'm sweating bullets. Now I'm thinking we need we need to get one of these guys now. Robert Herjavec, Dan and I discussed, he's an athlete. He's into a lot of this similar stuff in athletics space. He's out now.

We both look over and we see Mark. If you watch the show, Mark is using one of our other products, Sore Tool Pro, which is a lightweight, you know, very do it yourself friendly Gaston type tool. Runners love it. It's lightweight. They throw in their runners bags. Anyway, long story short, he's using that tool on his neck and you saw the way it unfolded. He said, my neck hasn't felt this good in a while, and that's why I'm going to give you a deal. And Dan and I both, you know, audibly exhaled. And I think the weight lifted up off of our shoulders, and we knew we had done it.

We knew we'd figure out all the due diligence and all the behind the scenes business. At that moment, we were elated to know that we had. I think we both agreed before we went into the tank that Mark Cuban was the guy we wanted. For a lot of reasons.

SG: And what was your original offer. I think you're asking 100 K for 20% or 10%. Was it for ten? I'm sorry, for 10%. Okay for ten. So what? He came to a different point.

DS: 100 for 20%. Okay. What's funny is the producers, the producers tell you when you get an offer, don't just say yes, we'll take it. They're like, you know, whisper to each other. And we did. And, but the funny part was like, I think I whispered to David, you know, we're taking this, right? So I said, yeah, yeah, but.

SG: I was just joking with my wife about that. To find out what they said.

DS: Yeah, it was like we were mulling things over, like, what do you think? Should we take this billionaire on as a pilot?

DR: Yeah. We both. So that that doesn't matter. Like the numbers, the equity at that point wasn't as important, you know, as we thought it would be. It was the prospect of adding Mark Cuban, you know, philanthropist, business self-made billionaire and, you know, athletic and entertainment mogul, adding him to our cap table. At that point, it didn't matter of 10 or 20% equity. It's never been about the equity for Dan and I. I mean, obviously as good stewards of a business, we want to create the most efficient business. We want to grow revenue. We're worried about our profits and losses. We're worried about our margins. But really, I mean, if you asked us, we want to help people feel great. We want to help people do more things that they love, the same way Dan treats his customers. I mean, I call them customers. He calls them patients. The same way Dan treats his patients every day at his clinic. That's the way I look at our customers.

They're more than customers to me and Dan, they become part of our kind of overall family. A lot of them do. I've become friends with more customers than you can even imagine. You know, scores of customers have become friends of ours. You know that where we go and run Spartan races with them and we do things outside of the realm of business, you know. The beauty of this business for me is not only following through on an idea, a crazy idea at that, but building something, a community. And that was the one thing that Mark said to us after we got through a lot of the black and white, you know, contractual stuff, he said, keep building your community, keep growing your community.

It's working for you. People are resonating with the product, but they really are coming back because of the community. And it's a lot of work, but it's so rewarding and on so many levels. Scott, It's really a rewarding venture that we've undertook here. And the fact that we can help people do things and help ourselves, you know, it's that rewarding feeling you get when you make somebody feel better and it's just like, I know Dan understands it because that's his life and that's for sure. For me, in the last six years, it's filled a hole in me as an artist. I've always tried to create things that make people feel better or make them feel some sort of emotion. I'm a fine artist. I do a lot of drawings and paintings and stuff. Not so much anymore because I'm so busy. But this is it gives me that same feeling, you know, it's an emotional response for a different reason.And it's it's just as rewarding.

SG: So yeah. No. And that's why I think so many people I mean I mean your ride has been incredible obviously in terms of the, well it's hugely positive. But I mean, just in terms of the accomplishment getting on the show, like you said, I mean, it's a show everyone wants to be on. You got the right partner. You got you didn't give away a ton of equity. I mean, you did a good job on the negotiation. You didn't come in with a ridiculous, you know, valuation. You know, which might have sent you to the exits early.

All right. So now give us a sense of how has life changed since Shark Tank. And one of the other things I was wonder is I think a lot of businesses struggle with the fact. I mean, granted, you have some leeway, but, you know, usually orders skyrocket and you guys are looking at production levels of things you know, that you obviously weren't dealing with prior to Shark Tank. And I know you had some lead up time to that. You could anticipate some of that. But how has that been? And then how has, and I don't know how long exactly you've been working with Mark, but can you give a sense how Mark has supersized your business? Like what has Mark brought to the table to you guys, and what does that partnership look like?

DR: I mean, like you hit the nail on the head, you know, when you air on Shark Tank and it doesn't always happen for every company because it comes down to what you sell, comes down to your product, your price point. You know, if you sell, for us, our price point was right there. It was in a sweet spot where people saw value in it. So when we aired on Shark Tank, our sales skyrocketed, overnight. You know, we, Dan and I decided to have a friends and family event, at a local sports bar, and I'm so glad that we did. It was an amazing experience.

Dan and I sat there, and we were just soaking it all in. You know, we were nervous about, will there be enough food? Will it be enough beer? Are the TVs loud enough this night? And then it just started to kind of coalesce. You know, we both calmed down and we both really lived and we just sat in the moment and we enjoyed, looked around and we looked at all the people and all of our loved ones and friends sharing this moment with us.

They didn't know whether we got a deal or not. You know, only a small, small fraction of the people that were attending knew, and then when the moment came on, you know, they watched our they watched our pitch and they watched our segment and the whole bar got quiet. And then when Mark gave us the deal, it just exploded and erupted into this joy. And it was palpable. And at the same time, my phone, you know, which I track all of our sales on Shopify started to go crazy, you know, and this is this is no secret. We've told people about this. It just stopped. It didn't stop ringing and dinging. And Shopify has that chi-ching sound. If you've ever if you've ever run a business on that platform, every time you make a sale, it goes chi-ching.

SG: Oh I didn't know that.

DR: So I turned my volume on and it just started to make this crazy whirring sound of these overlapping chi-chings for probably, what, 45 minutes straight? It didn't stop.

SG: You may have amazing lives, but I don't think I don't think there's a single moment like that's going to be hard to eclipse, you know? Okay, maybe the birth of another child or maybe something I don't know, Powerball, I mean, I don't know. I mean, is there anything else?

DR: Compartmentalize all those wonderful family things, like I would never compare it to, I mean, I get it, I've had I've had three children. Dan has, you know, we have children. There's nothing like that. But that moment when the phone started ringing, from a business owner standpoint, that was like seeing your child be born and take its first steps and graduate college all in the same moment.

You know, we knew we had it. We did it. You know we did. I don't talk about numbers very often, but our sales jumped thousands of percentage points overnight. So Dan jumped into action. We mobilized the next day. He was packing orders with his wife and family. I was packing orders with my wife and family. We were were quickly mobilizing together to get everything filled as quickly as possible.

Now, I have a good friend who is a CEO and executive coach, and she gave me one piece of advice. She said now is the time to focus on accuracy, not speed. So it kind of ran counter in my mind because I'm monitoring my laptop. I'm seeing the sales continue to roll in after day one, day two, week two, week three. The sales have really not slowed down. So we're under the gun here. You know, we're in the weeds as far as what a chef would say. You know, we've got so much going on, we knew we could fill it, but it was every day Dan would pack hundreds of orders and bring them over, and I would pack hundreds of orders, and we would bring them in my wife's truck over to the post office and ship it.

Now it's not something when you start a company, you never you never think to yourself, oh, I'm going to be in the trenches as like a shipping clerk. But I'm glad we did it. It was so rewarding and gratifying to experience it on that granular of a level. It makes you appreciate fulfillment houses and three Ps and warehouse managers, you know, we did it all. And his wife and my wife and I and our kids collectively did it all. We dug ourselves out of that tremendous hole that we prayed for, and we wish that would happen to us over the five years. But it was it was it was overwhelming. But it was all a great job.

SG: Yeah, that's called the full entrepreneurial experience there. Dan, what have you found Mark's brought to the business? Or, how long have you been? How long has it been since you've really been, you know, working with him in some capacity? Or working with him regularly?

DS: When it first aired, it's basically a handshake deal. And it probably took about, man, 5 or 6 more months to get a written deal. Like they make sure David and I aren’t criminals and, you know, they want to make sure that all the numbers that I said on the show were accurate are the year to date sales, our quarterly, sales. So I had to give them all this data. And he's doing this with all the companies he signed on after the show. It was a little bit of a slow process.

But once we crossed our T's and dotted our I’s when we were contract with him, Mark definitely opens his whole staff to us, he definitely gives us access to his team. If you have a question about financing, you know, you go to this guy, you have a question about marketing. You need help with that. You know, maybe David and I need a tie breaker from somebody like, I think, you know, black. He thinks white. It's like, all right, let's go to Q and see what Q says. So. And he's in on all of it, too. Like he'll chime in. I told, my wife, like the first time that happened when he responded to one of my emails. I mean, I can't believe a billionaire just responded to my email and in like ten minutes, too. It wasn't even like two days later. It was like ten minutes later. The guy really never stops. He never stops working. He’s so accessible, you know, sometimes he'll give us, like, short little one word emails like, K, like, not even okay, like, K. Or it'll be like, no, no, don't, no, don't do it. Bad ideas. No.

SG: Just knowing Mark from this show, you know, these things I can just picture exactly how it's great. “You can send 20 of the ‘k’ emails out compared to only ten of the ‘okay’ emails out”.

DR: He’s the way comes across on TV. He's that same way and in person, through email. I mean, he's so efficient, but he's so accessible. Like Dan said, you know, that first experience I sent him this long email and within ten minutes he responded, it was short. It was to the point, but it answered the question that was at hand. And he hasn't wavered from that. You know, it's been over a year. And he's always there for us. His team is there for us. And they're the best at what they do. So, knowing that we have them on our side not only opens a lot of doors for us, but it but it also gives us the confidence and credibility sometimes that as an entrepreneur, you question, sometimes, you know, that you've heard of it. Sometimes you get in this mindset. What is it? I'm drawing a blank. Sorry, but that there's that. Let's skip that. Let's keep going.

DS: Murphy's Murphy? You talking about Murphy's law?

DR: It's like when you question your, you know…imposter syndrome. I should have it now because I couldn't think of it.  It doesn't happen too often to us. But every once in a while, when you're dealing with the enormity of whether it's a podcast and you stumble on your words or you're trying to make a deal with, you know, a room full of millionaires and billionaires, sometimes you say to yourself, you know what? What makes me qualified to do

And I have no problem admitting that we figured it out every step of the way. As a team, you know, we've got the support of our families. And like you see, as a 50 year old man, I couldn't think of something. And eventually it kind of comes back when you just you calm down and you trust yourself and that really you can apply that to a lot of different situations.

So I'm actually kind of glad that happened because it's a good lesson. It happens in every room and every conversation we have. You know, Dan and I sometimes have to figure out how we're going to ship 400 pounds of soap to Colorado to get it to the volleyball, you know, box, and then deal with this. And we figured it out every step of the way.

SG: Yeah, you guys are amazing. And you've been very generous with your time. Final question. What's next for Sorsoap?I know you've got some exciting things coming up. You may or may not be at liberty to talk about any of that, but any thoughts on Sorsoap’s future?

DR: Well, I want to toot Dan's horn a little bit and pat him on the back. He was selected to give the keynote address at the APTA conference coming up. I'm not sure when this podcast will air, but it's going to be, in July and the beginning of July, Dan was chosen as the keynote speaker at the APTA Future of Therapy Summit.

SG: Congratulations Dan, that's a huge honor.

DS: Thanks!

DR: I'm so proud of him and the future of our business. You know I think we're actively working to make some exciting retail partnerships. But like Mark said, right when our partnership formed, “Build Community”. So we're working on still building community. We're doing a lot of live events. We were at the Philadelphia marathon last year. We're planning on repeating that, and finding more and more opportunities to get the word out and grow the awareness of how simple it can be to treat yourself, and especially with our products. But really, it's the mindset of being able to help yourself feel better and treat yourself.

SG: That's great. And, Dan, you'll be interested. We're actually having, the APTA president, Kyle Covington, on the show in a couple of months. And one of the big reasons we're having him on is like, how is the profession promoting entrepreneurial activities? And I know they've done a lot. I think they've really done a lot. And they want to do more to show value to membership, to recognize that parties can be entrepreneurs for sure. And there are a lot of successful examples. So I didn't know that you were going to be the keynote speaker, but that's incredible. And it, to me, is APTA is putting their money where their mouth is in terms of, you know, they want to get to really, you know, successful entrepreneurial activity.

And and it's wonderful for the profession, the type of things you guys are doing. And David when they combine and you can, you know, bring in other folks and do that collaboratively with people who have other skill sets. Wonderful. So folks, I won't take up any of your time. You've been fantastic. I love your story. You guys are great guys and I wish you nothing but continued success.

DS: Thank you Scott.

DR: Yeah thank you Scott. This has been a real wonderful experience. Thank you.

SG: You're very welcome. All right. Keep up the good work. To all our listeners. Thank you very much. We'll see you next month with another exciting and interesting story. Thank you.

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