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So Wang turned to online sales, trying to sell the instant jar anywhere from Amazon to eBay and the Newegg electronics retailer, as well as to the Web site. Instant Brands.
"It turned out that Amazon is the ideal market for us because we get feedback from our customers, which really helps us determine what we need to do next product iteration," Wang told CNBC Make It.
Instant Pot made its first sale on Amazon in November 2010 for $ 140. Wang says that he still remembers how ecstatic he was to think that someone believed enough in his product to buy it on Amazon. "It brings immense joy," he says.
Sales on Amazon began to gain ground, with about one or two units moved per day at first, and three months later, that figure rose to about 30 sales per day. "And then we focus on Amazon," Wang said.
It is in 2011 that Wang began to read religiously every customer comment of the Instant Pot on Amazon. Last year, he told CNBC Make It that he had read nearly 40,000 Amazon reviews for his products. It's a practice he's still pursuing today, although Wang says he's now lost count of the total number of critics he's read.
In one case, in 2012, Wang read a review of a user who suggested that Instant Pot adds a yoghurt manufacturing feature. When Wang added this feature to the popular Instant Pot game, he made sure to find his author and send him a free template, "as a sign of gratitude," he said. (The Duo is now the most popular Instant Pot model, says Wang, and "millions have been sold.")
"They are honest customers who tell us what they like, what they hate and what they want," Wang said of customer comments. "These are the three key parameters we always take into account when designing the next iteration of Instant Pot."
In 2011, Wang introduced the second-generation Instant Pot, which included a blasting feature. This version also featured a remodeled interface, as some customers had been baffled by the mysteriously flashing dashes of the previous generation when the Instant Pot was plugged in. Instant Pot cooked or not.
It's this second-generation instant pot – the Lux 6-in-1 programmable multi-purpose pressure cooker, also priced at $ 140 – that has made Wang's company profitable. The updated device has become an Amazon bestseller in the category of multicookers in the summer of 2012, with 2,000 units sold per month, Wang explains.
But there was a lot more to come.
In 2015, Instant Pot launched its Facebook page because Wang "s realized that we needed an extra commitment with our end users. [and] Understand what Instant Pot is all about, "he adds, and he chose to rely mainly on word of mouth promotion because he had a very limited budget and he wanted to spend the money. This budget for the product was essential.It was thought that Instant Pot could It also sent a few hundred free devices to a list of gourmet bloggers to numerous chefs and celebrity chefs to help them become better known. The following summer, in 2016, the buzz around Instant Pot had become so important, a feverish tone.
This led to the real breakthrough of Instant Pot, when Amazon sold 215,000 of its Instant Pot stocks on the First Day in July. Wang remembers the day well: although he had worked with Amazon for months to plan the sale, it seemed "unreal" and "very annoying," he says.
Each subsequent Prime Day has also been a Banner Sale Period for Instant Pot, as well as the Black Friday selling period at Cyber Monday after Thanksgiving in the US, Wang explains. However, he also notes that the revenues from these periods do not represent an unbalanced amount of his company's total annual sales, suggesting that Instant Pot products are selling fairly quickly throughout the year. (Amazon has not responded to requests for comments for this article.)
There are now about 10 versions of the Instant Pot on sale at the Instant Brands website, whose price ranges from around $ 65 for a 6-in-1 Lux Mini model to a nearly three-liter $ 180 for the Ultra 10 model in 1. quarter model. (Product prices may vary by retailer.)
Instant Brands CEO told CNBC Make It that his company was following a "fairly strict release schedule", featuring an updated version of the instant pot every 12 to 18 months. "[A]After having Instant Pot for more than 12 months and the next Instant Pot is on the market, people evolve and the old is either given to family and friends, or used as a second unit at home, "said Wang.
Instant Pots are now also sold by dozens of other retailers such as Best Buy, Target, Walmart and Williams Sonoma (the latter has even collaborated with Instant Pot on a range of sauces and spices-based meal flour).
All was not perfect of course. Instant Pot had a pair of product recalls: in 2015, it recalled more than 1,100 "smart" model pressure cookers after receiving a handful of complaints about the risk of electric shock to users during use of the product. Then, in March, the company recalled more than 100,000 multi-cookers Gem 65 8 in 1 because of reports of overheating of the product that could lead to a fire hazard.
Wang explained that the latter problem was a manufacturing defect and that it had no connection with the product design, including its burn protection function. "Security is a major concern for society," Wang told CNBC Make It, noting that she had voluntarily recalled the product. "We must be responsible to our users."
As a private company, Instant Brands does not publish its sales figure, but Mr. Wang said that "several million" people had bought Instant Pots and that the company's sales had doubled each year since 2011.
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