‘Shark Tank’ Season 9: Kevin O’Leary Offers Behind-The-Scenes Glimpse

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like between pitches during a Shark Tank taping, Kevin O’Leary had the video for you on Sunday. The sharks, apparently not attending the Emmys like everyone else in prime time television, were on break from listening to entrepreneurs offering a stake in their businesses. O’Leary spent about a minute and a half on Facebook live, talking about what was going on.

As O’Leary described, the last pitch’s set was being dismantled and a new one put up. In the meantime, the sharks were waiting — O’Leary with black coffee, Daymond John and Lori Greiner chatting with others, and Robert Herjavec teasing that O’Leary’s Facebook live viewers were his mom and dad. There’s a lot of noise in the background, loud music and chatter, enough to keep the sharks awake during what was probably a long taping day.

At the end of the video, Lori and Kevin do a bit of a dance. Lori told Parade last week that indeed the shooting schedule for Shark Tank does put some long days into her routine. While she typically gets six or seven hours of sleep a night, when Shark Tank is taping, she’s up at 4 a.m. and in bed at 11 p.m. or midnight.

Those long days are worth it, however, not just for the viewing audience but for the sharks. They have the chance to invest in companies who make them a lot of money. According to an article in Inquisitr two years ago, Greiner and O’Leary were the most likely to make offers on-air.

Of course, that doesn’t mean the handshakes lead to contracts, however. Last year, Forbes spoke with 74 percent of the entrepreneurs who had been offered deals during Seasons 1 through 7 and found 43 percent of those deals fell apart after the show and another 30 percent signed a deal but it was different from the agreement made on the Shark Tank carpet.

Although O’Leary was drinking black coffee during the taping, he gave another piece of insight into the Shark Tank set by posting a picture to his Instagram page of what appears to be a cast menu. The days may be long, but the production team kicks in the meals.

O’Leary is still mugging for the camera with his other Shark Tank investments as well, including Wicked Good Cupcakes. The family-run company based out of Boston appeared back in Season 4, but Fortune reported last week it’s turned out to be one of the most successful Shark Tank investments. The bakery specializing in cupcakes in a jar has monthly sales of $400,000, a huge bump over the $7,000 they were making before coming onto the program. Kevin O’Leary still gets a royalty on every cupcake sold.

Shark Tank is on a new night for Season 9. They’ll make themselves at home on Sunday evenings starting with a two-hour season premiere October 1 on ABC.

[Featured Image by Andrew Burton/Getty Images]