Promotional products play a bigger role in ABC’s reality show Shark Tank than one might think.

Sure, there have been many products pitched on the show that have ended up in the industry one way or another: Supplier Quikflip Apparel (asi/89364) appeared on Shark Tank in 2019. Echo Valley Meats (asi/51576) entered the promo industry a few years after accepting an investment from Mark Cuban. Counselor Top 40 supplier Koozie Group (asi/40480) has added Shark Tank-backed products AquaVault and FOAM to its product lineup. And that’s just to name a few.

The Sharks themselves have also swum into the promo world, with Robert Herjavec, Kevin O’Leary, Barbara Corcoran and Daymond John all appearing as keynote speakers at ASI Shows over the years.

But promotional products also come in the form of custom branded apparel that entrepreneurs wear when they pitch – and wearing a company logo does have an impact on whether and how much a Shark invests, especially in later seasons, according to a Counselor analysis of publicly available Shark Tank data.

There have been roughly 704 products that have earned an investment from a Shark on the show, out of 1,514 total products pitched. (Notably, Sharks will often agree to a deal on air but then back out of the investment during due diligence.) So that means about 46.5% of pitches have earned some type of investment from Sharks. Of the products that have earned an investment, just under half (or 48.4%) of entrepreneurs wore some type of branded apparel.

Still, wearing a company T-shirt can’t hurt, and it can also have positive advertising and marketing effects, says Chris McCasland.

McCasland, founder of City Bonfires (asi/45223) and The Chair Blanket, and his wife, Tiffany, wore logoed T-shirts when they appeared on a season 17 episode to pitch The Chair Blanket. Longtime Shark Herjavec ended up investing $200,000 for a 20% stake in the company. The product is offered in promo via a partnership with Counselor Top 40 supplier Gemline (asi/56070).

“You see so many people on there that are wearing a suit or just wearing a black T-shirt or whatever,” McCasland says. “There’s going to be all these screenshots forever of us standing up there. Why wouldn’t you have your company logo on it?”

Chris and Tiffany McCasland wore their company logo on tees when they pitched The Chair Blanket on a season 17 episode of Shark Tank.

Overall, about 44.9% of entrepreneurs wear some type of company-branded apparel when they pitch to the Sharks. Most wore T-shirts, but others have donned custom vests, hats or sweaters.

Branded T-shirts have become more common as the seasons progress. In season one of Shark Tank, which aired in 2009, only about a quarter of contestants wore a logoed shirt. For the past few seasons, that number has risen to just over 50%.

With the rise in vertical video, it makes sense that companies would want their logo visible as much as possible, in case pitch footage gets clipped and circulated on social media.

In later seasons, wearing logoed apparel also seems to correlate with higher Shark investment. Since season 12, for every pitch that’s earned an investment of over $1 million, the contestants were wearing some type of logoed apparel, according to a Counselor analysis. In the highest investment in Shark Tank history – a $3 million complete buyout of Moki Door Step by John – the inventors wore company T-shirts.

In season one, of the 16 products that received investments, only two companies wore promotional apparel, compared to 28 out of 51 pitching companies in the latest season. Investments and general products per season have increased over time, but the willingness to wear logoed apparel has as well.

It goes without saying that there’s more that goes into a successful Shark Tank pitch than wearing a company-branded T-shirt. But in such a hyper-competitive environment, perhaps logoed apparel gives entrepreneurs an edge and helps them to stand out.

Indeed, branding is extremely important to at least one Shark. In a keynote speech at ASI Show Chicago in 2018, Herjavec told the audience that his employees at The Herjavec Group can only wear a suit or a logoed shirt at work. And the Herjavec logo is displayed prominently across all the company’s imagery and promotional materials.

“One thing I’ve found is great companies believe in their brand, and marketing isn’t a dirty word,” Herjavec said at the time.