Here's something you might be interested in.
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
Response Expo/invention convention held downtown
"As seen on TV" wares seen here first
Frances Prado and Melinda Silva pitch their Hanging Secrets to TV brand investors
Inventors from across the country converged on San Diego this week with the hopes of being discovered by one of a host of "as seen on TV" marketing firms gathered to talk shop.
For ten years, the Response Expo has called San Diego home, meeting this year at convention facilities at the Hilton Bayfront downtown. The event, which targets "performance-based marketers: anyone who measures, tracks, and monitors the results of their advertising campaigns," also drew 42 aspiring inventors pitching products in various stages of development.
The inventions ranged from the mundane (plastic bumpers that clip onto hangers to stop suit jackets or leather coats from drooping at the shoulders) to the seemingly already done (a trash-grabber converted to dog-poop scooper; clip-on cell-phone-speaker amplifiers; battery-charging cases). Among the inventors, a pair of San Diego locals stood out.
"I started with a hand-sketch in 2009, and in 2014 I brought a prototype to Dr. Silva to show her — I figured she would be my target market," said Frances Prado, who had just emerged from a high-stakes filmed pitch session with Telebrands, promoters of hundreds of infomercial-pitched products.
Prado and her partner, Melinda Silva, are seeking a national distributor for Hanging Secrets, a bra-and-lingerie organizer, which they've patented and have completed a 1000-unit production run.
"I loved it. I wanted to buy it but it wasn't available. So I invested in manufacturing," added Silva. "I'm happy to say the quality turned out excellent and we have 100 percent positive feedback from our clients."
The pair launched their brand, Ageless Beautiful Clever Creations, LLC, in late 2015.
"We launched the product in September 2015, and we attended the Minnesota Inventors Expo, where Hanging Secrets won a bronze medal in the most creative product category," continued Prado. "We also have two boutiques here in San Diego selling the product….
"Last night we won the pinnacle award here for best in show," Silva continued.
While the pair has sold only about 100 bra caddies so far and relies on donations to breast-cancer survivors as a cornerstone of their independent marketing, they're hopeful that being picked up by a powerhouse marketing company like Telebrands or one of the home-shopping channels will vault them to success.
Some inventors, though, aren't as far along in the process.
"This is a prototype — the production model will fold up to the size of a briefcase, and it'll weigh less than five pounds," Dion Thomson said of his Fulcrum Force, an all-in-one exercise machine that, Thomson explains, pits the user's body weight against them during a handful of resistance-training routines.
"I think there's limited product out there as far as resistance training," continued Thomson, who is currently marketing the device via a YouTube video. "You've got free weights, which are big and bulky, or universal machines — those take up a ton of space, too.
"I got a provisional patent about a year and a half ago, and the full patent is pending…. I’d like to get some big outfit that will see the value here to license and distribute it."
Here's something you might be interested in.
Response Expo/invention convention held downtown
"As seen on TV" wares seen here first
Response Expo/invention convention held downtown
"As seen on TV" wares seen here first
Frances Prado and Melinda Silva pitch their Hanging Secrets to TV brand investors
Inventors from across the country converged on San Diego this week with the hopes of being discovered by one of a host of "as seen on TV" marketing firms gathered to talk shop.
For ten years, the Response Expo has called San Diego home, meeting this year at convention facilities at the Hilton Bayfront downtown. The event, which targets "performance-based marketers: anyone who measures, tracks, and monitors the results of their advertising campaigns," also drew 42 aspiring inventors pitching products in various stages of development.
The inventions ranged from the mundane (plastic bumpers that clip onto hangers to stop suit jackets or leather coats from drooping at the shoulders) to the seemingly already done (a trash-grabber converted to dog-poop scooper; clip-on cell-phone-speaker amplifiers; battery-charging cases). Among the inventors, a pair of San Diego locals stood out.
"I started with a hand-sketch in 2009, and in 2014 I brought a prototype to Dr. Silva to show her — I figured she would be my target market," said Frances Prado, who had just emerged from a high-stakes filmed pitch session with Telebrands, promoters of hundreds of infomercial-pitched products.
Prado and her partner, Melinda Silva, are seeking a national distributor for Hanging Secrets, a bra-and-lingerie organizer, which they've patented and have completed a 1000-unit production run.
"I loved it. I wanted to buy it but it wasn't available. So I invested in manufacturing," added Silva. "I'm happy to say the quality turned out excellent and we have 100 percent positive feedback from our clients."
The pair launched their brand, Ageless Beautiful Clever Creations, LLC, in late 2015.
"We launched the product in September 2015, and we attended the Minnesota Inventors Expo, where Hanging Secrets won a bronze medal in the most creative product category," continued Prado. "We also have two boutiques here in San Diego selling the product….
"Last night we won the pinnacle award here for best in show," Silva continued.
While the pair has sold only about 100 bra caddies so far and relies on donations to breast-cancer survivors as a cornerstone of their independent marketing, they're hopeful that being picked up by a powerhouse marketing company like Telebrands or one of the home-shopping channels will vault them to success.
Some inventors, though, aren't as far along in the process.
"This is a prototype — the production model will fold up to the size of a briefcase, and it'll weigh less than five pounds," Dion Thomson said of his Fulcrum Force, an all-in-one exercise machine that, Thomson explains, pits the user's body weight against them during a handful of resistance-training routines.
"I think there's limited product out there as far as resistance training," continued Thomson, who is currently marketing the device via a YouTube video. "You've got free weights, which are big and bulky, or universal machines — those take up a ton of space, too.
"I got a provisional patent about a year and a half ago, and the full patent is pending…. I’d like to get some big outfit that will see the value here to license and distribute it."
Comments