With Modern Picnic, lunchboxes have never looked so luxurious. The company sells a line of fancy food containers disguised as handbags and backpacks. Looking from the outside, you’ll never guess it’s meant for grubs and bevies. Founder Ali Kaminetsky recently appeared on Shark Tank but didn’t get a deal. After Shark Tank, Modern Picnic is worth $6 million.
Ali Kaminetsky’s Story
Ali came up with these stylish lunch boxes after graduating college and interning at Macy’s buying program. The bubbly brunette thrived and was promoted to omni-assistant buyer.
Every day she brought lunch to work to save money and stay healthy. However, she didn’t like the design and sustainability of her lunchbox. She looked around in stores, but there were only options for men and children. This encouraged her to fulfill this gap in the market.
Establishing Modern Picnic
The aspiring inventor made a prototype for the first Modern Picnic bag in 2018. Because it’s a unique product, the process of making it come to life was tricky, but Ali made it work.
In under a year, she started selling vegan leather lunch boxes directly to consumers. The company went viral multiple times and got coverage from 20 renowned publications. One video on TikTok alone generated 3.8 million views, the power of social media!
This popularity helped the startup close a $900,000 pre-seed funding led by Fandango founder Michael Cline in 2021. By 2022, Modern Picnic’s total sales surpassed $3.5 million through selling over 17,000 units. Before the year ended, they raised $102,250 from 158 investors on Republic.com, a crowdfunding platform.
Getting on Shark Tank
Since founding Modern Picnic, friends urged Kaminetsky to apply for Shark Tank. Going viral on TikTok definitely helped as Shark Tank producers use TikTok to find companies for the show. Ali came into the Tank seeking $400,000 for a 6.5% equity stake, valuing the business at $6.1 million.
After Shark Tank
Modern Picnic is expecting a huge boost in sales after delivering a memorable pitch on Shark Tank. The business doesn’t have many direct competitors but that could change after the show. Companies that appear on Shark Tank tend to get ripped off afterwards. Since it’s a good product, it should also go viral again on social media.
Check out ModernPicnic.com to see all of their products and collections. The same items can also be found on the company’s Amazon store, where one of its best-sellers, The Luncher, has a 4.8-star rating from 265 customer reviews.
Regular prices range from $59 to $250 but if you want to buy in bulk or plan to do some reselling, visit their wholesale page on Faire.com. Currently, Modern Picnic has four full-time employees for daily operations, but it’s unclear if they will expand along with the expected growth in sales. The lunch box market is expected to be worth $200 billion by the end of 2030 according to verifiedmarketreports.com.
