Here’s What Became of Bruw Following Shark Tank

It’s hard to believe there was a time before cold brew. But back in 2015 – the same year Starbucks introduced its first cup of cold brew – budding entrepreneur Max Feber had a sense that cold brew was going to be the next big thing. The then 15-year-old Michigan teenager tried making his own at home and found cold brewing to be, well, a grind. That’s when he came up with Bruw, a home brewing system he fashioned using two mason jars, a filter cut from a screen door, and a straw. Three years later, he found himself on “Shark Tank” asking for $50,000 for 25% of his company.

Impressed with Feber’s entrepreneurship and knowledge of the show at such a young age (he had been watching since he was 8 years old) three of the “sharks” made offers. But when Mark Cuban referred to Feber as a “mini me” and offered $50,000 for 30% of the company, Feber quickly said yes, and a deal was made.

During his appearance, Max Feber positioned Bruw as a cost-effective way to make cold brew at home. Home brewing systems were available, but, as Feber noted, they cost hundreds of dollars. The Bruw filters for his system sold for $15 to $20. In the year before his appearance on the show’s tenth season, sales were $50,000 and, he told the panel, he expected to double that in the year ahead. The “sharks” nodded heads when he shared he had received a patent for the filter just a few days before the episode was filmed.

This wasn’t Feber’s first foray with a business competition show. After starting with a $10,000 cash infusion from a Kickstarter campaign, the teen had appeared on a local version of “Shark Tank” called “Hatched.” Following his appearance on that show, Feder signed deals with Home Shopping Network and Grommet.

Kevin O’ Leary expressed a few concerns about Feber, first noting the entrepreneur had a single product rather than a full-fledged company — a frequent complaint of the self-professed Mr. Wonderful. He was also worried that Feber, then in his freshman year at Babson College, would not be able to focus on the business full-time. Nonetheless, O’Leary offered the requested $50,000 but wanted 50% of the company. Damon Johns made a competitive offer for 30%. But, after Mark Cuban suggested Feber switch his focus from bringing down the product’s landed cost to using advertising to drive sales, Feber took the former Mavericks owner up on the same 30% Johns had offered.

Speaking to students at Clark University, Max Feber told the young future entrepreneurs he made more money in the 48 hours following his appearance on the show than he had made in the two years prior. To keep the momentum going, Feber FaceTimed customers who had abandoned their shopping carts before purchasing his products and ended up with an 80% close rate. Recognizing that choosing the wrong roast was one of the things you can get wrong when making cold brew, Bruw also sold coffee blends specifically for the system, along with mason jars and full kits.

Feber’s belief in the strength of the cold brew business proved prescient. Cold brew differs from iced coffee not only in how it is made but also in its nuanced flavor. Using cold water instead of hot extracts less acid resulting in a smoother, sweeter coffee with fruity or chocolatey notes. When the “sharks” asked why coffee companies would want to bother with the additional effort of making cold brew – the ideal steep time is 12 to 18 hours — Feber noted that Peet’s was getting $2 more per cup of cold brew versus traditionally brewed iced coffee. In the 10 years since Feber first invented Bruw, cold brew sales climbed from $100 million to nearly $1 billion.

Initially, Max Feber expanded Bruw’s business by adding tea to his line-up. Some of this progress aside, he ended up selling his business in 2020 to another “Shark Tank” enterprise, Snarky Tea, for an undisclosed amount. Snarky Tea no longer sells the system under the Bruw name but sells a similar apparatus called The Chill. 

Feber told a Babson College newsletter he sold the business because “I realized I began to wake up every day exhausted by the business. I didn’t feel the same energy as in the beginning. The thought of fundraising or significantly scaling Bruw was no longer exciting.” He also told the newsletter that he hoped to eventually run another company, but Bruw was no longer the right business for him at the time he sold it.

Max Feber graduated from Babson College in 2021 and, according to his Linkedin profile, worked at Impacked, a start-up packaging company, and Gay Water, a vodka-infused soda, before founding a new company, Bellwether, in 2022. Originally a platform meant to simplify civic engagement, Feber, in a 2024 post on Linkedin, said Bellwether had pivoted work with D2C (direct to consumer) brands looking to “make money by helping the world.”

Feber clearly gained a lot of wisdom from his “Shark Tank” experience. As he told Forbes, “The Shark Tank process takes so long and it’s so high risk that it’s really not about raising money.” Instead, “It’s about gaining a strategic partner and gaining publicity, both of which you don’t usually get with conventional VCs, and getting the badge of Shark Tank.”