S08.E01: ISlide, Re Think, Fizzics, Spoonful of Comfort

[yeswedo]

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Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown touts the benefits of personalized shoe slides; a 16-year-old high school junior impresses the Sharks with an app that can stop cyberbullying messages before the damage can be done; two men designed an ingenious at-home beer dispenser that uses sound waves to makes bottled and canned beer taste like draft; a woman proposes sending heartwarming chicken soup. Also, an update on 2400 Expert, an SAT prep course in which Mark Cuban invested during season seven.

[Amarsir]

When the show promoted a 6-chair episode I was intrigued. But I have to say it did feel like too many. There was just too much of the Sharks talking over each other. I know it sucks when someone's out on a deal they might be perfect for, and unfair that Kevin, Robert, and Mark seem to get permanent seats. But 6 shouting at once is just too many.

[BusyOctober]

Agree...6 egomaniacs yelling over each other and shouting out questions was annoying.  Looks like Barbara had some work done over the break...she looks good, but I think her surgeon forgot to remove the stick up her ass. 

The chicken soup people didn't have a chance.  I don't know if the business would ever take off, but I think their pitch was a bit off base. The woman did mention her mom as inspiration after she was diagnosed with cancer. But then the talked turned to sending good old fashioned chicken soup for making someone with a cold feel better. If my college kid or my sister is 100's of miles away, ordering soup today to be delivered in 3-5 days is dumb. A cold doesn't last that long (unless it's my husband with his biannual man cold).  I think a better pitch would be to position this as something you send to someone recuperating from an illness.  I would have used examples like her mom's cancer diagnosis, or a new parents home from having a baby, or a friend recovering from knee replacement or a family caring for a seriously ill parent or child...these folks could use a nice meal that requires little prep since they have limited time or mobility.  I think it would be more appealing as a "meals on wheels" model; it's a way to offer comfort in a box  (&a remove the chore of cooking) to loved ones too far away for you to hand deliver a casserole or a batch of cookies.

i guess those slide slipper shoes are popular enough, but I think they are hideous.  The only places they're fashion appropriate are at the pool/beach, or in institutional bathrooms. 

[mjc570]

I didn't mind having the six of them, I was just relieved they didn't throw in the GoPro guy.  I think the sharks' personalities are so well established by now, they kind of slot in with each other, like archtypes.

Speaking for myself, I am sick to death of literal sob stories - the only tears I want to see are tears of joy.  Sorry, I don't care if your business was inspired by your dead relative, I don't care if you got laid off, I don't care about your personal struggles.  If I want to know background stuff like that, I'll go to your website.  What I care about is your product, its usability, price and availability.

I absolutely loved the coder girl, and her app.  I thought she was awesome, and a great role model - not just for girls, but for boys as well  I'm so glad she didn't get an exploitative or manipulative offer.  That was a good point, though, about identifying whether it should be pursued as a charity or a business. 

The soup lady just rubbed me the wrong way.  The crying, the faces, the over-talking.  I just feel she would be difficult to work with.  I agree that the problem with the food delivery model is the immediacy- In lots of areas, you can pretty easily have food delivered (like through GrubHub or a local restaurant) right away.  For that matter, you can easily find a pizza place near the person who needs cheering up, and have one delivered.  This seems like something Amazon would or could do better.  The cookies did look good, though.

I can't wait for the small size beer thing to become available, as my son just informed me that just about all of his friends do like to drink beer at home, by themselves.  To be honest, I can't remember if they got a deal or not, but the beer sure looked good.  Hmm,beer and cookies - time for a snack:)

Added:  I laughed at the way the slipper guy just walked out without his NFL guy, leaving him behind.  Stay classy, guy.

Edited September 24, 2016 by mjc570
forgetfulness, spelling

[KaveDweller]

I actually didn't really think the six Sharks made a huge difference. They always talk over each other anyway. But it did seem like everyone got a little less time than usual.

I'm so glad I wasn't the only person who was annoyed by the soup business. When the woman started talking about her mother I was worried that she was going to get a deal from crying, and was very glad she didn't.  I hope that doesn't mean I'm a terrible person. I'm sorry for her loss, but the business was just awful. With shipping that is $85 dollars for soup and some rolls, that is insane and no one is going to do that except in really special occasions.

I really liked the coder girl too. I love the idea and think it's interesting that she did a study and found teens actually changed their messages from it. I do think it's valid to wonder if the idea is a money maker, but I had a feeling Mark would give her a deal.  He looked really happy when he asked who did the coding and she said she did it herself.

[Jersey Guy 87]

The soup idea was horrible - $85 for soup that will be delivered in a couple of days?  Amazon will deliver a carton of cans of Campbell's soup that's there tomorrow (worst case) for a whole lot less.

I've seen the beer thing before, I think I got a link to their crowdfunding campaign.  My recollection is it's good with some styles of beer, not so good with others.  Sharks were eager to jump in on that.

My son's basketball team is thinking of getting "branded" slides. $50 seems a little high, though.

Coder girl carried herself a whole lot older than 16.  And I mean that in a very positive way.

[Primetimer]

We've got a surfeit of Sharks, as all six are squeezed into the studio for the Season 8 premiere. Maximizing the number of Sharks will maximize the thrills and fun, right?!

View the full article

[Jobena]

I don't like Daymond with hair. 

[candall]

Wow, the Sharks really love their brew.

Daymond looks sharper without hair.  I liked the photos of all of them from back when they were scruffy upstarts.

 

Request to mods:

Hey, would it be possible to start noting one of the products in the episode title?  The repeats are just as interesting as the new ones, if you haven't seen them before.  I think a lot of people watch "new" old episodes and it's painful trying to track down the corresponding thread.  Thanks!

Edited September 24, 2016 by candall

[rhys]

All of them seemed to be sporting new dos (maybe not Mark & Kevin).

Loved the beer deal & will order some for my sons for xmas. The 16 year old was wonderful. I'm surprised to hear that 93%(?) of her respondents said they would change their text replies. That seemed high. But good on her anyway.

Soup idea was nuts. That poor sucker who already invested 1.3 million. Yowza

[starri]

Goddamnit, Lori, don't make me start to like you.

In another first, they found a teenager who wasn't annoying.

[KHenry14]

The soup thing was way overpriced. No way anybody is going to spend $85 + for chicken soup, even good chicken soup. I'm a bit surprised that they didn't go into that aspect of the product more than they did. But I guess they was so much wrong they couldn't go into it all. 

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[basiltherat]

We've seen sharp 16 year olds before, starting back with the Sugar Scrubs girl (oh, and sharp teenage BOYS as well!) that absolutely run rings around some of the delusional adults!

Seconding the suggestion above that anyone in need of comforting a loved one can google delivery restaurants in their loved ones' hometown and send soup, pizza, or Pad Thai to them from a local joint.

[Just Good Sense]

Yeah, based on the "This season on Shark Tank..." cold open, we're in for a lot of tears this year. The producers apparently have decided what America wants to unwind to after a hard work week is weepy business owners (which, admittedly, makes a perverse kind of sense). I believe we got three out of four this episode breaking down—all but the 16-year-old girl!

[Latverian Diplomat]

Did the "lesser" sharks band together and demand more appearances, necessitating the extra chair? I wonder.

One of the principles of e-mail, is if you write one when angry or upset don't send it. Wait a while and come back to it. Very good advice. Of course the kids these days are all about texting, so everything is shorter and faster but the same principle applies. ReThink won't help with hard core, determined bullying, but it could help typical teenagers have a little more restraint.

One thing that helps flower delivery is that there's a national network of local suppliers and delivery services. So they don't get killed by shipping costs. It will  be interesting to see if people start using food delivery services like BiteSquad for "care packages", though, as there does seem to be something of a niche there.

WTF with the iSlide guy turning down that offer?

[starri]

I could see sending chicken soup as a novelty once (although probably not at those prices), but unlike, say, flowers or candy, you can't sent it for Mother's Day or a birthday.  And this is perhaps unkind, but I don't know if the news that one of my parents had been diagnosed with cancer that my first impulse would be to send soup through the mail, rather than get on a plane.  And of course, the crying.

Flip-flop guy is a blooming idiot.  I wonder if he was crying because he realized that he'd just totally blown it.

[ClareWalks]

The soup thing was spectacularly bad. If I wanted to send someone soup, I would call a local restaurant and have them deliver it, instantly and for about 1/5 the cost or less.

[Cyranetta]

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The soup thing was spectacularly bad. If I wanted to send someone soup, I would call a local restaurant and have them deliver it, instantly and for about 1/5 the cost or less.

Which means that, if you want to spend as much as $85, you can get almost a whole week of delivered dinners, and for someone recuperating from an illness or dealing with a house move, that would probably be more appreciated than one expensive symbolic meal..

The young coder was impressive not just for her product, but for her grasp of the business/marketing plan aspect (even if she wasn't aware of the possibilities of a single carrier).

[nottopbravo]

6 hours ago, Latverian Diplomat said:

One of the principles of e-mail, is if you write one when angry or upset don't send it. Wait a while and come back to it. Very good advice. Of course the kids these days are all about texting, so everything is shorter and faster but the same principle applies.  

This is great advice, and I have used it for years with every e-mail I send or even a post that I write.

What I don't understand is how the software works.  Even it if flags words like "ugly", "creepy", or other such adjectives, a "creative" bully could get around them.  Instead of sending the "you are ugly" message, what if the sender wrote " you seem very handsome, but you are not".  I doubt the software could flag that.

[Eolivet]

7 hours ago, starri said:

And this is perhaps unkind, but I don't know if the news that one of my parents had been diagnosed with cancer that my first impulse would be to send soup through the mail, rather than get on a plane.

Thank you -- I thought I was the only one who thought that! Maybe she told the story wrong, but it sounded like "When I heard my mother was diagnosed with cancer, all I wanted to do was send her chicken soup. Six weeks later, she was dead." For $80, that's half a plane ticket during a fare sale! Use that money, buy a plane ticket, and make chicken soup for your sick mother by your damn self.

Now if I heard an elderly relative or a friend was sick, maybe I would think of sending something rather than visiting, but that business really rubbed me the wrong way. $80 (including shipping) for soup, rolls and cookies?! The only message that would communicate to my relative is that I got royally ripped off.

I liked ReThink as an incremental way to reduce cyberbullying, though I was slightly puzzled that it sounded like she was making deals with schools. Do a lot of teenagers do their cyberbullying...through the library computers?

[RemoteControlFreak]

7 hours ago, ClareWalks said:

The soup thing was spectacularly bad. If I wanted to send someone soup, I would call a local restaurant and have them deliver it, instantly and for about 1/5 the cost or less.

Right.  And it wouldn't require the sick and/or tragedy-stricken friend/relative to have to unpack it, get out a pot, heat it up, wash the pot, etc.  Gifts that require labor before they can be used are generally a bad idea.

And haven't these people watched Shark Tank ever?  Business ideas that require shipping food around the country are rarely met favorably.

Edited September 25, 2016 by RemoteControlFreak

[nlkm9]

The soup thing was spectacularly bad. If I wanted to send someone soup, I would call a local restaurant and have them deliver it, instantly and for about 1/5 the cost or less.

about 8 years ago my best friend in NY was diagnosed with cancer and was sooo upset she couldnt eat--for 1/2 the price I sent her grandmas chicken soup", same exact service but not even half as expensive--she loved it!! surprised none ever mentioned this....

[Latverian Diplomat]

2 hours ago, nottopbravo said:

This is great advice, and I have used it for years with every e-mail I send or even a post that I write.

What I don't understand is how the software works.  Even it if flags words like "ugly", "creepy", or other such adjectives, a "creative" bully could get around them.  Instead of sending the "you are ugly" message, what if the sender wrote " you seem very handsome, but you are not".  I doubt the software could flag that.

Yeah, I suspect that it will be OK at helping out kids of generally good will in a moment of weakness, but it's not going to do much about someone determined to nasty.

Edited September 25, 2016 by Latverian Diplomat

[starri]

Honestly, if I had children, I'd forbid them from going within a mile of social media.

[ichbin]

1 hour ago, Eolivet said:

Now if I heard an elderly relative or a friend was sick, maybe I would think of sending something rather than visiting, but that business really rubbed me the wrong way. $80 (including shipping) for soup, rolls and cookies?! The only message that would communicate to my relative is that I got royally ripped off.

My thought exactly!   Most of my relatives would be horrified if I were to send them an $80 jar of soup.  

I could see an idea like this potentially as a local small business endeavor but only if it were at a much lower cost to the customer. 

[LotusFlower]

12 hours ago, rhys said:

The 16 year old was wonderful. I'm surprised to hear that 93%(?) of her respondents said they would change their text replies. That seemed high. But good on her anyway.

This issue was the first thing I thought of, so I was shocked to hear this number.  Not to sound so cynical, but how reliable is it?  Isn't it a common phenomenon (in surveys and polls) to give an answer that doesn't necessarily speak your truth, but rather makes you sound better?  

[theatremouse]

I doubt the number came from surveys. I think the app probably reports back. I think depending on the age of the kids, it's potentially a good tool just trying to get them in the habit of thinking before they speak. Even if the success rates were lower, trying to reinforce the concept sooner will (I would hope) have decent longer term effects. At least better than nothing. It's sort of training yourself to have better impulse control. 

[starri]

The other thing about iSlide is that I'm not entire sure how viable a business model based primarily on DJ Khaled is.

[RemoteControlFreak]

On 9/24/2016 at 9:51 AM, rhys said:

All of them seemed to be sporting new dos (maybe not Mark & Kevin).

Loved the beer deal & will order some for my sons for xmas. The 16 year old was wonderful. I'm surprised to hear that 93%(?) of her respondents said they would change their text replies. That seemed high. But good on her anyway.

Soup idea was nuts. That poor sucker who already invested 1.3 million. Yowza

What she actually said was, "I ended up conducting a 1500 trial study and found that over 93% of the time when teenagers get this alert, they change their minds."  She didn't say anything respondents saying what they might do.

Assuming she meant "1500 person trial study," this raises all kinds of questions about the effectiveness of the study and of app. Who were the 1500 people?  Did they voluntarily install the app or was it, say, given to them to try out in exchange for some reward?  Was it installed on school devices or on the teenagers' own phones?  She alluded a lot to installations on school-owned devices.  Logically, a kid would be more likely to change a text on a school-owned device or if they knew they were part of a monitored study, but this doesn't reflect the real world environment.

More importantly, I wanted to see for myself how it worked, so I downloaded and installed the app and tested it out with some common insulting phrases like, "you are a jerk."  It never flagged any of these.  

The girl was extremely impressive so if this doesn't work out, she'll succeed at something else unless her ambition burns out.

[Diana Berry]

Coder girl was awesome.  Glad she got a deal.

[woodscommaelle]

I found myself saying "Shut. Up. Lori!" several times this episode. 

Was Mark Cuban wearing skinny jeans when he visited a school? Dislike.

Edited September 26, 2016 by woodscommaelle

[psychoticstate]

Daymond doesn't look like Daymond.  He needs to shave his head.

I also didn't notice a huge difference by having all 6 sharks because as has been said, they continuously talk over each other anyway. Drives me crazy.  I suppose the only major difference is that there's yet another person to shut Robert out.  Does Mark have something against him?  Because I've noticed that Mark always seems good with going in on a deal with Lori but never with Robert.

The coding girl was super impressive. If someone is a serious bully and totally intent on sending a mean/cruel message, they are going to do what they are going to do, app or not.  I've always told my friends that before you send a flaming email or text message, send it to yourself first.  After you've had the chance to calm down and read it, most of the time you won't send it on because you just needed to get it out.  Unfortunately I do have a former friend that never followed the advice and was constantly getting her ass in a sling with her impulsive messages.

The slides/flip flop guy was an idiot for not taking the deal.  Seriously.  What did he want?  Was he another of those jerks that isn't looking for a deal so much as free publicity? 

The beer guys - -yeah, I'd try to get it on that deal too.

The send-a-soup thing was bizarre. On the one hand, I get it.  For someone who is ill, or coming home from the hospital, or dealing with something like a death in the family, it makes sense.  But NOT at $85.  That's just ridiculous.  If she had been able to price it at $50, maybe.  Or maybe structure it where the recipient is getting food delivered twice or three times during that week.  I think her only other option is to aim to be  a local small business, where she delivers the soup/rolls/cookies locally so there is no shipping charge and it can be delivered same day. No idea if she can get her costs down. 

[Jersey Guy 87]

13 hours ago, psychoticstate said:

I also didn't notice a huge difference by having all 6 sharks because as has been said, they continuously talk over each other anyway. Drives me crazy.  I suppose the only major difference is that there's yet another person to shut Robert out.  Does Mark have something against him?  Because I've noticed that Mark always seems good with going in on a deal with Lori but never with Robert.

I think the issue is that Mark and Robert both fill essentially the same role - they're the tech-oriented guys.  So they don't bring different skill sets to the table to help an entrepreneur.  Lori has her QVC/Bed Bath and Beyond angle which is something Mark doesn't have so she can help him out in that sense.

[psychoticstate]

2 hours ago, Jersey Guy 87 said:

I think the issue is that Mark and Robert both fill essentially the same role - they're the tech-oriented guys.  So they don't bring different skill sets to the table to help an entrepreneur.  Lori has her QVC/Bed Bath and Beyond angle which is something Mark doesn't have so she can help him out in that sense.

That makes sense.  Thank you, @Jersey Guy 87.

[mtlchick]

Unrelated to the entrepreneurs, Robert had that about to be married/newlywed glow on his face (depending when this was filmed.)  It's good to see him happy. 

The brew your own beer home seemed intriguing and I can see that being popular for many people especially the college set.  And I think the coder has a great future ahead.  I don't know if the app is it but I can see Mark mentoring her in the long term. 

[ae2]

10 hours ago, mtlchick said:

Unrelated to the entrepreneurs, Robert had that about to be married/newlywed glow on his face (depending when this was filmed.)  It's good to see him happy. 

I think that was hair dye running down his face that you saw :)

I thought for sure with 6 sharks that we would be seeing a really amazing pitch that all the sharks go in on, so that the show can promote it's first 6 shark deal or some such nonsense. Otherwise it didn't feel a whole lot different to me, except that maybe no individual shark stood out as much as they usually do. 

On 9/25/2016 at 11:21 AM, RemoteControlFreak said:

More importantly, I wanted to see for myself how it worked, so I downloaded and installed the app and tested it out with some common insulting phrases like, "you are a jerk."  It never flagged any of these.  

 

On 9/24/2016 at 6:29 PM, nottopbravo said:

What I don't understand is how the software works.  Even it if flags words like "ugly", "creepy", or other such adjectives, a "creative" bully could get around them.  Instead of sending the "you are ugly" message, what if the sender wrote " you seem very handsome, but you are not".  I doubt the software could flag that.

This is just my assumption, and I'm no expert, but I would guess that right now the app just uses simple pattern matching to look for common derogatory words and phrases. (Although I'm a bit surprised that 'jerk' wouldn't be caught.) This is the easiest way to implement it, but is prone to a lot of errors. For example, if it is just looking for the word 'ugly' in your message, it would alert you at both "Tim is so ugly!" and also "I made an ugly mistake today."

Beyond that you can use natural language processing and sentiment analysis, which is the beginning step toward the computer 'understanding' the words. A lot of tools and companies use sentiment analysis on a large number of tweets to gauge the feelings around a topic. Here is a PDF paper where Stanford students recently did a study on sentiment analysis for the 2016 presidential candidates. (Scroll to the bottom is you just want to see the results!)

There's also a fun little tool here that you can play around with some basic sentiment analysis. It isn't perfect either. "What a stupid jerk!" gets a 0.9 negative score, but you can trick it down to a 0.5 by saying "what a beautiful stupid jerk." And yes, even with something like this "you seem very handsome, but you are not" would slip by! I'm not sure it has the same punch as "you're so ugly!" :)

[ClareWalks]

15 hours ago, mtlchick said:

Unrelated to the entrepreneurs, Robert had that about to be married/newlywed glow on his face (depending when this was filmed.)  It's good to see him happy. 

Agree, he looked happy! I think it was filmed pre-wedding, I checked for a ring and didn't see one.

[yeswedo]

On 9/24/2016 at 9:49 AM, candall said:

Request to mods:

Hey, would it be possible to start noting one of the products in the episode title?  The repeats are just as interesting as the new ones, if you haven't seen them before.  I think a lot of people watch "new" old episodes and it's painful trying to track down the corresponding thread.  Thanks!

Great suggestion! The episode titles on TVDB are always 'Episode x' in advance and then get updated after the show airs. We can edit the topic titles post-episode as well.

[Ottis]

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There's also a fun little tool here that you can play around with some basic sentiment analysis. It isn't perfect either. "What a stupid jerk!" gets a 0.9 negative score, but you can trick it down to a 0.5 by saying "what a beautiful stupid jerk." And yes, even with something like this "you seem very handsome, but you are not" would slip by! I'm not sure it has the same punch as "you're so ugly!" :)

That tool is flawed. It sees no difference between "You suck balls," and "Will you suck my balls?" Both are equally negative. Maybe it has an agenda?

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And this is perhaps unkind, but I don't know if the news that one of my parents had been diagnosed with cancer that my first impulse would be to send soup through the mail, rather than get on a plane.

ITA. We were both floored at the way she explained that, because everyone watching at our house would have been at the airport.

Edited September 29, 2016 by Ottis

[cooksdelight]

The camera kept focusing on the facial expressions of soup lady, to the point I figured the only reason they were on the show was so the show could make fun of her. Stupid idea, too expensive, and her expressions were the only valid reason for not changing the channel.

I loved the teenage girl, but her pitch didn't have much to do with coding. According to my computer geek boyfriend.

[JeezumCrow]

One thing that struck me about Soup Lady was the fact that her base price didn't include shipping - for a product that HAS to be shipped. If the basic shipping fee is $15, I'd rather that be included in the face price; additional fees for expedited shipping could be added on at checkout. Why Say it's $69.99 when it's literally impossible to obtain said product without spending $84.99? 

 

And, of course, all previously mentioned criticism regarding this product/business is spot-on. 

[KaveDweller]

23 hours ago, curlyblackeggs said:

Why Say it's $69.99 when it's literally impossible to obtain said product without spending $84.99? 

To trick people into thinking they are spending less. More people probably decide to buy and then just click okay when the shipping comes up, than would have decided to buy for the higher price.

Amazon doesn't include shipping in any of their prices either.  I think it's pretty rare for online business to do that, and then they advertise "free shipping." 

[theatremouse]

They'd probably benefit from some A/B testing as to whether they have more success with a "this is the price including base shipping - but hey pay more for expedited or otherwise special shipping" vs "this is the price, and when you check out you see shipping, but by then you've already made the decision to buy so you're less likely to let any sort of fees dissuade you unless you find them completely excessive" approach.

That said, since they're already overpriced in my estimation (and apparently lots of people here as well), aiming for door number 2 is probably the smarter bet since you're enticing people with a lower number. In general most wisdom suggests unless you go bonkers with the fees such that they're a disproportionate part of the purchase, it makes more sense not to roll it into the price because people make the decision to buy based on the price-price and usually accept taxes/fees/shipping/whatever as a normal fact of life showing in the cart when you check out. (usually) Fewer will bail once they've gotten that far than might never go that far if the starting number were higher by the same amount.

[JeezumCrow]

3 hours ago, KaveDweller said:

To trick people into thinking they are spending less. More people probably decide to buy and then just click okay when the shipping comes up, than would have decided to buy for the higher price.

Amazon doesn't include shipping in any of their prices either.  I think it's pretty rare for online business to do that, and then they advertise "free shipping." 

Yeah, I get that. Amazon is different because Amazon sells many different products and shipping can vary based on the size of the package. In this instance, you're ordering a canteen of not-enough soup, a handful of rolls, and some cookies. It's a set package, like Blue Apron is X amount of meals (or similar services) and it includes shipping in the advertised price because you can't obtain the product without shipping. It's not like there's a whole catalog of meals to choose from that they couldn't build in shippin. It's foolish to assume most people will just click through on shipping, especially when you're spending upwards of $50 on the product. And it's obvious that they were praying anyone dumb enough to spend that much on soup would have so much disposable income they wouldn't care about a shipping charge. I still find it to be one of many fatal flaws for this business model. 

[Kel Varnsen]

The beer thing seemed dumb, and i love beer and have actual beer on tap at home. Seems totally like the kind of thing that people would put on their wedding registry and then use once a year. Especially if itis hard to clean. Plus the demo was flawed, since the fizzics beer was served in a better glass, which will make a difference in flavour. It also looked like the beer straight from the bottle was poured softly to minimize foam.

[JeezumCrow]

12 hours ago, Kel Varnsen said:

The beer thing seemed dumb, and i love beer and have actual beer on tap at home. Seems totally like the kind of thing that people would put on their wedding registry and then use once a year. Especially if itis hard to clean. Plus the demo was flawed, since the fizzics beer was served in a better glass, which will make a difference in flavour. It also looked like the beer straight from the bottle was poured softly to minimize foam.

I tried a beer via Fizzics at a local expo. It was good, but not remarkably (~$200) good. But I had been drinking for hours, sooo....

[Kiss my mutt]

I wonder if it bothers Robert that he always last to get picked for the teams. I feel kind of bad that as soon as he goes in for a deal the presenters seems blatantly disinterested and disappointed that he's the one interested and look pleadingly at Mark or Lori to save them. 

It would be interesting to see how the deals divide up and how successful they are by Shark. 

[starri]

I think Groovebook might distort those kinds of numbers.

Otherwise it's doubtless that Lori's products are the best performers.

[lh25]

On 9/24/2016 at 5:17 PM, RemoteControlFreak said:

Right.  And it wouldn't require the sick and/or tragedy-stricken friend/relative to have to unpack it, get out a pot, heat it up, wash the pot, etc.  Gifts that require labor before they can be used are generally a bad idea.

Yep!  I am currently going through Cancer treatment, and and while I'm grateful for any gift, I do think "Please don't give me chores".  Things like plants that I have to plant outside and take care of for example.  This would be one of those things.

[chocolatine]

4 hours ago, lh25 said:

Yep!  I am currently going through Cancer treatment, and and while I'm grateful for any gift, I do think "Please don't give me chores".  Things like plants that I have to plant outside and take care of for example.  This would be one of those things.

I wish you a full and speedy recovery, and I'm horrified that anyone would send you plants that you have to plant yourself!

You probably already know about this, but there are websites/apps like Lotsahelpinghands where you can make a list of meals, chores, etc. that you need help with and your family and friends can sign up for them. So those that want to help can actually do something helpful.