Kanga Before Shark Tank
Cold drinks are a favorite for many people, especially in the hot summer. Unfortunately, cold drinks need refrigeration, and sometimes where the drink is cooled, it’s so far from where it’s supposed to be drank that it’s warm by the time it’s at its chosen destination. Styrofoam coolers are one solution to this problem but they need large amounts of ice and because of this they sometimes become too heavy to carry anywhere.
Logan Lamance, Austin Maxwell, and Teddy Giard are 3 young men who often drank warm beer when they went to watch games because their coolers were too heavy to be carried to the stadium which was at least a mile away.
One day while at the stadium, they observed someone taking beer from a casing which kept it cool. From this, they got the idea to make a casing for the whole pack. They decided to start a company called Kanga that sold the casing to insulate beer and soda. The Kanga bag was made with a cardboard case that acts as an insulator, a liner that acts as a watertight barrier, and a layer of foam.
Kanga’s offices are in South Carolina, the same state that the trio is from. Although Logan, Austin, and Teddy had developed the product and even got a few orders, they still did not have enough money to run the company and so applied to be on Shark Tank hoping to get an investor. They were called to be on the 18th episode of the 10th season.
Kanga On Shark Tank
The sharks toasted to season 10 and as they tasted the beer Kevin asked them for their sales since there were many coolers in the market. Austin said that they had recorded sales of $103,000 and they had only been in business for about 6 months. Mark Cuban then asked them what their sales outlets were.
Austin said that their first sales channel was e-commerce which had been launched on Kickstarter and was the source of 30% of their sales. They also had a business-to-business sales stream that they called custom wholesale. Their business-to-business products were customized because the business-to-business department offered products to companies that wanted their own logos on the casings.
Lori then asked them how they came up with the product. Logan said that it started as part of a class project. The trio all studied at Clemson University and they were asked to make a project that solved one of the problems that they experienced. They then developed the product after observing someone putting a beer in a canned insulator to keep it cool. Instead of having an insulator for a single can, the whole pack should be insulated.
Barbara asked them how long the beer stayed cold and she was told 7 hours. Mark Cuban then asked them what their sales price was for the custom bag and the one sold over the counter. He was told that the 12-pack was sold for $29.95. 24 and 34-packs were also available and these were sold for $34.95. Custom bags cost on average $20 per unit.
Kevin complained about the lack of a sales channel that involved them going directly to beer manufacturers and selling the product to them. Austin said that they were approached by the largest brewery in the world, Anheuser-Busch. Anheuser-Busch wanted Kanga to provide casings that had logos of their three top brands.
Anheuser-Busch made an order from Kanga for $16,000 and it was for a test order. They had said that if they liked how it went they would order 10,000 units. Barbara asked them how much they had invested in the business. Logan said that they had each invested $833 into the business. They had no working experience having just graduated from college.
Austin said that he had always been a fan of Shark Tank and when Beatbox Beverages was being pitched on the show, he got inspired. After the episode aired, he called the company and would work with them first as a customer, then as a brand ambassador, and eventually as an intern. Austin had many job offers which he turned down to work with Beatbox Beverages.
Mark Cuban then offered them $100,000 for 20% of their company as he had given every beer company that was on Shark Tank an offer. Austin accepted the offer. Austin said that to him the deal was a sign that anything is possible and if people believed in something they should go for it.
Kanga Now in 2025 The After Shark Tank Update
The Kanga website lists stores that stock their product. Kanga coolers’ social media presence has increased significantly since it was featured on Shark Tank. It has a page on 7 different social media sites and these are Instagram, Tik Tok, Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, Spotify, and Youtube.
Kanga’s Tik Tok page is its largest page and it has over 174,000 followers on it. Its Instagram page has over 55,000 followers and its Facebook page has over 22,000 followers. On Spotify, Kanga normally gets more than 16,000 monthly visitors. On Linked In, Kanga has nearly 4,000 followers. Its Twitter and Youtube pages are the smallest with both having less than 2,000 followers.
The company’s annual revenue is $3,000,000. When the company was started they were working in Logan’s parent’s house but they now have their own headquarters still in South Carolina. It looks like Kanga is still on an upward trajectory and has no signs of letting up.
