Where Is FunBites From Shark Tank Today?

Getting picky eaters to eat their food — let alone enjoy it — can be a Sisyphean feat. To address this problem, entrepreneur Bobbie Rhoads created FunBites. Rhoads, the mother of a picky eater, says that she spent a ton of time at meals cutting her daughter's food into little bites, a plight many parents can certainly sympathize with. Her solution was the FunBites tool: A finger-safe, kid-friendly curved cutting tool that cuts food into fun, bite-sized shapes with the intention of making it more exciting to kids (and, hopefully, more likely to eat it).

Rhoads launched the company in mid-2011. By the time she pitched the Sharks in 2015, FunBites was on Amazon and in mom-and-pop shops across 20 different states and 10 different countries. She'd done $400,000 of sales in three years. She'd gotten into Kohl's and Bed Bath & Beyond but was held back by bad packaging. Just before appearing on "Shark Tank," she was picked up by Target and caught the attention of Marvel and Disney.

With a packaging redesign, she was seeking help getting into more stores and further licensing. Her pitch to the Sharks was to grow the reach of the product to big box stores, seeking $75,000 for 20% of the company. After back and forth between Lori Greiner and Daymond John, Rhoads cut in Greiner with a deal of $75,000 for 25% of the company. Greiner held up her end of the deal: FunBites has been going strong ever since.

One of Lori Greiner's selling points for Bobbie Rhoads was her access to the big stores that Rhoads had her eye on. With a special section in Bed Bath & Beyond and relationships with all the relevant stores, making a deal with Greiner made a lot of sense for Rhoads. And it certainly panned out. Within one week of the episode airing, FunBites saw $150,000 in sales — about 37% of what the company had made in three whole years.

As of 2016, one year after appearing on Shark Tank, Fun Bites's distribution grew to 450 stores, including Buy Buy Baby and Bed Bath & Beyond. The product won over 25 design and innovation awards, including Kimberly Clark Huggies Mom Inspired, Mom's Choice, Mom's Best, Parent Tested Parent Approved, Green Scene Mom, and National Lekotek Able Play for Children with Special Needs like Autism. As of 2023, Insider Worth says the company is valued at an estimated $1.4 million. As of 2023, the retail price had dropped from $13 per unit at the time the episode aired to a current price of $9.99 per unit via Amazon.

Studies have shown that up to 22% of kids in any age from 2 to 11 years old are picky eaters, and any parent can verify the struggle. Part of FunBites' success was that it easily grabbed hold of morning shows and daytime news media like "Good Morning America." "Busy mom with picky eater makes product to solve picky eating problem" is a story that every outlet targeted toward parents of young kids will clamor over, and that's exactly what happened. The tool was featured in Parents magazine, Real Simple, Parenting, Working Mother, Women's Day, Littles, Special Moms, and more. And with the fun shapes, colors, and kid-friendly usage, they also took to advertising to kids themselves on networks like Nickelodeon. In subsequent years, FunBites has also started advertising dog treat cutters to pet owners.

But does it work in practice? The green square cutter — the top featured product on FoodBites's seller store — has 4.1 stars out of 5 over more than 850 reviews on Amazon. However, Pattern says consumers don't actually consider a rating to be "good" unless it's 4.5 or over. The top positive review talks about its ease of use and cleaning, and that it's effective not only in convincing a picky eater to eat but also in convincing a happy eater to slow down. Less glowing reviews reference the tool smushing the food, sandwich contents squeezing out during use, and the sometimes extreme effort required to cut food like hamburgers.