Modern Inventor

I just returned from the National Hardware Show in Las Vegas where we observed the soft launch of our new product, the Straptor. The Straptor is an innovative bungee cord that we licensed to Olympia Tools, Inc.. It has some cool features and a cool look and will show up later this year (on our site and hopefully in stores!). I was there with my Vice President of Sales, Andy Welty, and Abe Alexander, who is a project manager here at Trident… and also my realtor!

We met up with Allan Thorne (and his lovely wife Lacey), who is the inventor of the Straptor. We helped Allan develop his product and license it to Olympia. Allan is a guy who had an idea and believed in it and went for it. He came to us with amazing prototypes that won me over immediately. Very few people actually take it all the way, but Allan executed.

Olympia is a California (and China) based hand tool company. They are lean and mean and of a nice size to do business with. Big enough to get some work done, but you can still meet with the president. He is a very obviously sharp guy, as is everyone there. Hopefully they will have success with the Straptor and we can work with them to expand the product line. That’s how it works: you can’t expect a company to get whole-hog behind your product without establishing a track record first. You may want them to launch with 10 models, but realistically, they will usually start with one. And it makes sense. They want to test the waters before they jump in.  

Plus, there are always issues when you first launch a product. You ALWAYS learn something in the first few runs that makes you want to change something. Better to not have to change 10 sets of tools! The market will give you feedback about which path to pursue next. Of course, it is still helpful to conceptualize the potential future product family. This helps show your partner the potential value of your invention should it succeed enough to warrant further development. You want to spend just enough energy developing these line extensions that you can show a nice picture of something, but you shouldn’t sweat too much over the details until it appears there will in fact be further development.

Anyway, the Straptor was well-received, which means people said “That’s interesting. Let me know when you have pricing”. And then, of course, it will be time to try and write actual orders. So wish us luck!