As a financial planner and partner in BD Planning Partners in Chattanooga, Brad Burcham has been a long-time fan of the “Shark Tank” TV franchise since the program debuted on ABC in 2009.
Although he has heard hundreds of entrepreneurs pitch business ideas over 15 seasons, Burcham was particularly impressed with a pitch last year by an Idaho couple eager to serve ice cream on freshly made dough cones covered in cinnamon sugar and cookie powder. Company founder Jeremy Carlson said the Crispy Cones concept came out of a church mission trip to the Czech Republic, where residents would make pastries and cones on the side of the road.
“By the end of my mission, I had a dream of making these type of cones in the U.S.,” Carlson said in his 2023 appearance on “Shark Tank.”
Carlson started the business on the side of the road in a tent in 2018 when he was a freshman in college making cones cooked on a specialty grill, fresh to order with the ice cream powdered to each individual’s taste.
Burcham said he was immediately struck by the Crispy Cones concept, and after Jeremy Carlson and his wife, Kaitlyn, won $200,000 of backing from “Shark Tank” investor Barbara Corcoran, Burcham immediately pursued a franchise.