Columnists
The crisis and the entrepreneurial mind
The coronavirus is a significant public health emergency: of that there can be no doubt. And it is painful to see hoarding taking place, especially when the most sought after items show up reselling on the web at many multiples of their original price. But there are entrepreneurs out there who are developing innovative new products to take legitimate advantage of the opportunities the crisis has provided.
Three new products with their origins in the County aim at the shortages of the most sought after items—masks, hand sanitizer and toilet paper.
As to masks, Cherry Valley resident Jemima Fyffe has seen just how many people are donning face masks to make their way around in public—and how boring the masks look. “They’re all white or grey or hospital. blue,” she noted. Then she saw that supermodel Naomi Cambelll had made a fashion statement of sorts while boarding a plane in Los Angeles wearing a hazmat suit, goggles, a blue face mask and pink latex gloves. And then she turned on her television that day and reminded herself that The Masked Singer was the most popular show around. “So I concluded that there must be a demand out there for customized masks”—a fact borne out, she notes, by the universal reverence shown to the artwork on NHL goalie masks.
So she has started a company—Hazmask Inc.—that turns out bespoke germcatching face masks. “You send us your facial measurements, send a paint colour sample and we’ll ship you 50, 100 or 500 masks within a week,” she says. It also turns out that the Chinese manufacture she is using has a contract to produce Halloween masks for trick or treating, so she is able to offer stock masks featuring cartoon characters like Homer Simpson, Sonic the Hedgehog and Donald Trump. Fyffe figures that if the crisis lasts another month, she will make almost as much money as a County-based Airbnb makes in an entire season.
The hand sanitizer idea comes from Rossmore resident Toby Filcher. He explains it this way, “I was listening to all these public health people go on about the importance of washing your hands. And I noticed that they always go on to say that you should not touch your face. But I checked my own behaviour and realized I was constantly touching my face. So what I plan to do is market a face cream that makes it painful for you to touch your face. It’s an alcohol based product that uses crushed jalapeño peppers as its active ingredient. Put this on, and I guarantee you’ll not touch your face more than once.”
“And the good thing about the product is that it will create a market for our companion product—jalapeño pepper cream removal solution. We haven’t quite worked out the formulation yet, but we are confident it will be available within a few months of our initial product.” Filcher is seeking venture capital funding to help launch his products.
The third product is probably the most ambitious. The Picton-based husband and wife team of Gerry and Susan Blenkinsop put it this way. “ Why should all toilet paper look the same? All the commercials do to distinguish a product is to claim that it is softer than its competitors. We want to make toilet paper with attitude, that’s fun to use. For instance, we’re close to securing the right to reproduce old Eaton’s catalogues, and we’ve found a special new paper that has the look and feel of an old outhouse catalogue, but that dissolves in water as easily as regular toilet paper. So using our product can be an exercise in nostalgia for a simpler times, without the corresponding need for an outdoor facility.
“Another product we’re looking at is having clients personalize their toilet paper so it can be embossed with a family crest, or a Latin motto, or a quote from a great thinker. If we do this on a large enough scale, the price point will come down to a level which will make our paper almost as affordable as the ordinary stuff—if you can find it.” The Blenkinsops claim to have their financing in place and are looking for a partnership opportunity with a local pulp mill.
In addition to masks, sanitizers and toilet paper initiatives, during our research for this story we also became aware of work being done on personal space enforcement technology. A six-foot diameter electric hula hoop is apparently undergoing testing at a workshop in Frankford. In Deseronto, a a scent-based approach—in which an individual would emit an unpleasant odour, not unlike that from a fart, that could be detected by those standing six feet away, but not by the wearer— is being studied. A razor-edge square dancing crinoline is also under development in Tamworth, and we have heard of fashion designers in Toronto working on “large wingspan haute couture,” Undoubtedly, we have only skimmed the surface of what will collectively be a massive innovative effort.
At this time of crisis, amid the panic and shortages, it is heartwarming to see that the entrepreneurial spirit can rise to meet the challenge. It is also instructive to realize how true it must be that so many business startups end in failure.
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