Russ: This is The BusinessMakers Show heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com. And it's featured guest time on the show and this is gonna be real interesting because my guest is Jimmy Jongebloed, Founder and CEO of Gripping Eyewear, Inc. Jimmy, welcome to the BusinessMakers Show.
Jimmy: Thank you, Russ.
Russ: Why don't we start by you telling us about Gripping Eyewear, Inc.?
Jimmy: Well, Gripping Eyewear, Inc. is a company that we started around several patents, intellectual property in eyewear that is basically designed to various patents that all collectively help you never lose your glasses again.
Russ: Cool.
Jimmy: That's kind of our motto.
Russ: As a glass wearer, I can appreciate that.
Jimmy: Yeah, for sure.
Russ: All right, well tell us about these patents.
Jimmy: The majority of them what we started with were patents that involved magnets on the temples of the glasses. If you could picture a pair of eyewear, if you have a pair of eyewear at home, if you can imagine when you close the temples or the arms like some people call it, the magnet's sort of at the center point to connect to each other, basically allows you to clip them on, everybody's got that story when you put the glasses on your shirt or in your shirt pocket and you learned over, they've ended up in the bottom of the lake somewhere.
Russ: Right.
Jimmy: Imagine the magnets, anything between there connects and also would then connect it to sort of your tackle box or refrigerator.
Russ: Okay.
Jimmy: As long as it was metal.
Russ: Cool. Now I think you have a pretty cool visual at your website. Correct? That those that are sitting by a computer right now could take a look at?
Jimmy: Yes, if they went to www.grippingeyewear – and eyewear is e-y-e-w-e-a-r.com, you can certainly see what I'm talking about. And the additional patents are basically accessories that also help you never lose your glasses again.
Russ: Real cool. Okay, now I've done a little homework on this, Jimmy, and I know that it wasn't exactly an easy straight line from getting the patent to where we are today.
Jimmy: No, no.
Russ: So why don't you go back to the very beginning and tell us how this all got started?
Jimmy: I was actually waiting to get my hair cut at a hair salon by a guy that's a friend of mine that cuts my hair and my wife. And he had been cutting this woman's hair who I'd never met before. And apparently she had talked to him about how her and her husband had a couple patents in the eyewear business and they were gonna change eyewear but they were running out of money and didn't know what to do with them. He said some nice things and then he also said that I'm a lawyer, which I am. A recovering lawyer.
And when I got up in the chair to get my hair cut all the sudden I had this woman that I'd never met before asking me, like I was being interviewed, you know, "Where did you go to school? How long did you practice law? Who'd you practice law with?" And I was answering all the questions, really not knowing why. And I got off the chair and I turned around and she slipped these very prototypical magnetic eyewear to my sleeve and said, "You'll never lose these. What do you think of that?" And I said, "Well, hum." And I immediately thought, "Bottom of Lake Travis, bottom of Lake Livingston." Everywhere my current sunglasses resided because certainly none of them were still with me.
Russ: Okay.
Jimmy: So I was a real good person to fall into this.
Russ: And that's were all of this started.
Jimmy: That's where all this started. She said, "My husband has the possibility of a worldwide patent on this." And I thought, "Okay, clearly this woman doesn't understand what a worldwide patent means because this is just too simple."
Russ: Right.
Jimmy: And sure enough, he did.
Russ: All right. So from there you apparently started a company.
Jimmy: We had one patent at that time and four others pending. And just to give you a progression, we now have nine worldwide patents with three others pending.
Russ: Wow, all of them related to this same application of magnets on eyewear.
Jimmy: They are. There's one that isn't related to magnets, but it is related to never losing and never scratching your glasses.
Russ: Okay. So I guess from there it's been just a piece of cake the rest of the way.
Jimmy: Oh, yeah, a cake walk. It's so easy to get a company up and running like that. I mean, it's a $380 billion a year business. There's 2.2 billion people that wear glasses. So as you might imagine as any industry that's that big the big boys aren't real keen to let a lot of the smaller companies in, especially when they have real good ideas that are really locked up patent wise, you know, they might have to pay for.
Russ: Well, you already mentioned that at this point it was this real kind of prototype that wasn't real smooth. How did you even take it from there to something that looks like it looks today?
Jimmy: Yeah, I mean, it looked horrible. There's no question. It just – but the idea of it, the idea that you could solve the number one problem in eyewear with such a simple patent.
Russ: Right.
Jimmy: We had sent out – when I decided to get involved and started raising money and putting everything today, we started November of 2003, but really January of 2004 we got the attention of one of the most revered and certainly one of the best eyewear piece makers. They make temples; they make nose pads for Cartier, Nike, all kinds of people.
Russ: Okay, and what was the name of that company?
Jimmy: Celcon Plastic, out of the Baluna Mountains of Italy, right where eyewear began really, for all intents and purposes. So we had to fly to Venice and we had to drive up in the snow to these beautiful mountains.
Russ: Tough duty, man.
Jimmy: Yeah, it was really bizarre because after talking to them, you know, we just didn't know what to expect when we got to this factory that was like – it just reminded me of what you'd see if you went down to NASA and they were building pieces of the space shuttle. I mean, just eat off the floor kind of clean. But what was neat was some of their top engineers had already worked on it. And by the time we got there they had taken what our patent was and turned it into something that looked nice. And it was real exciting because at that point in time I came back, raised some more money and now we were getting ready for the first big eyewear show in Milan, Italy every year, the MIDO, and we were gonna go up there and see what we could do.
Russ: Okay. Well, I want to pick up right there after this. We're talking with Jimmy Jongebloed, the Founder and CEO of Gripping Eyewear, Inc., and you're listening to The BusinessMaker Show heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com.
[Aflac Commercial]
Russ: This is the BusinessMakers Show heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com. And continuing on with Jimmy Jongebloed, the Founder and CEO of Gripping Eyewear. Well, your patent apparently was gaining traction pretty quickly and you'd improved the product that you had to show. And so you were gonna go to the big eyewear show, correct, in Milan?
Jimmy: Yes, that's correct. We had a new design. We actually had a new patent, a visor, a magnetic clip that could go in your car visor or golf bag or wherever to secure, once again, never lose your glasses again. We showed up there not knowing what we were gonna find, but certainly with a lot of excitement.
Russ: And then that was kind of the show for glasses?
Jimmy: It's the show. There's a show in Hong Kong but everybody calls this the show. It always is, it always will be. I mean, it's in Milan. It's just huge.
Russ: And it's nothing but glasses?
Jimmy: Nothing but eyewear. Yeah, nothing but eyewear. It's absolutely amazing. It was great because we, at the time, and this is significant at the time of the company's development, we did not have any designs at that moment on making our own eyewear. We were gonna be an aftermarket accessory. You'd go into your Vision Source or EyeMasters or whatever, and you'd buy your wire frame Calvin Kleins or Donna Karan and they would put magnets on them, retrofit.
Russ: So at the show you were trying to connect with all of those big brands to –
Jimmy: Well, we're trying to connect with both optical chains that might take our product and use it. But yes, like you said, really we went because surely Oakley and Ran-Ban and all of them would want to just pay me money to use the patents and get on with it.
Russ: Right there, right there, huh?
Jimmy: Yeah, I look back on that and it's just painful to think about how naïve we were. But –
Russ: The first hint that it didn't exactly go that way, right?
Jimmy: A lot of the people we were working with we'd retrofitted more Maui Jim's than anybody because 350 bucks for a pair of glasses you'd like to have something where you don't lose them.
Russ: Right.
Jimmy: Boy, we just thought that'd be the biggest hit ever, and the first big executive I met with was the Chief Operating Officer of Maui Jim and –
Russ: Wow, so you didn't have any trouble getting the meeting with him?
Jimmy: No, I think I scared somebody because I walked up and I had Maui Jim's with this new magnetic –
Russ: Oh, okay.
Jimmy: – patent on it and I said, "Hey, man this is fantastic. " I clipped it to one of the clerks and he looked like he was about to faint and pass out and ran back and next thing I know the guy comes up and he goes, "Hey, you have a patent on this?" And I said, "No, do we need one?" He kind of gave me a bad look. I said, "Well, of course I do. I wouldn't be talking to you." And he said, "Wow, I hope you run out of money," and handed me the glasses back. And I said, "Well, that's just not funny." And he said, "I'm not trying to be funny. I hope you fail. I hope you fall on our face." And I mean, my wife's sitting next to me. I'd just taken her whole future into this company. So this was a little harsh to hear in front of your wife.
Russ: And this was what the first big executive said, "These are –"
Jimmy: First day, first hour –
Russ: "– awesome. I hope you fail."
Jimmy: – of the show. Just woohoo. And he said, "No, listen, you know? Let me start over. I don't mean this bad but –," and everybody knows when you hear that you're gonna hear something bad.
Russ: Right.
Jimmy: He said, "I'm making a $12.00, $14.00 pair of glasses, I'm wholesaling them for 160 bucks. What in the world do I want to pay you any money for, period?" And he said, "Go ask all the major eyewear makers." And just to tell the audience, it's interesting to me designers don't make their own eyewear. So you have like 400 companies but you've got 14 to 20 major ones that make Ray-Ban, Donna Karan, Calvin Klein and all that stuff.
Russ: Okay.
Jimmy: And so he said, you know, "Go talk to Lexsok, and go talk to Marshon, Shelflow and just see how fast they throw you out." You know? And sure enough, I got, "Man, this is great. Get out. This is a great idea. I hope I never see you again."
Russ: Wow.
Jimmy: I mean it was phenomenal.
Russ: That was 100 percent consistent with all of them?
Jimmy: If it had been around I would have thought I was being Punk'd.
Russ: Yeah.
Jimmy: I would have thought I was on Candid Camera and Allen Funt's gonna walk out and go, "They're kidding." You know, because it was harsh to hear that.
Russ: But nobody said, "Well, come on in here. Let's talk and do a –," nobody seemed to walk to.
Jimmy: Some very small companies did, but even then it's like walking around trying to start your own computer software company in the face of the big boys.
Russ: Right, wow.
Jimmy: They just saw too many obstacles.
Russ: Wow, so were you completely bummed out?
Jimmy: Not quite as much as my wife was. But yes, I was – well, I was frustrated for sure, and knew we needed to change direction. But at the end of the day, you know, I'm sitting here with something that I think could be on a lot of glasses. And we just kept telling ourselves, you know, the spring hinge took five years to get into the market. And we kept saying, "Maybe we're the next spring hinge."
Russ: Okay. So you knew you had an impact, because they would all see you. But boy, they didn't appear to want to be willing to work with you the way you thought it was gonna happen.
Jimmy: Oh, that's exactly what was significant. We had an audience with everybody. It wasn't a long one, but we had an audience.
Russ: Okay. So does that mean you revamped the plan?
Jimmy: We did. We came back and we sat back and thought, "We better come up with a business plan in about five days before the next investor meeting or we've got some real bad news to report."
Russ: Right.
Jimmy: So we had been fortunate in over the next call it year, we added two very significant people to the company, Henry Rothschild, who was in the eyewear business for 30-someodd years and had set up and ran the second largest eyewear maker in the world's sales force in the majority of the United States for 20 years.
Russ: So he became associated with the company?
Jimmy: Yeah, I was supposed to interview him and I walked in and I go, "How's President sound? Does that sound good? Because if you'll take that then you're hired. Now let's talk about what you do." I mean his resume is amazing, and really he just said, "Look, this is the most obtuse business you've ever seen and we've got to start making our own glasses. We've got to get it to the people."
Russ: So you had to abandon this idea of just sort of licensing to them and actually make your own glasses to appeal to the consumer.
Jimmy: Abandon's not strong enough a word.
Russ: It's not? Okay.
Jimmy: We had to totally put that off to the side and then to get it to the consumer we were very fortunate to add Jim Jernigan to our team who is, of many things, President of Guthy-Renker Asia and had been one of the top infomercial people in the country.
Russ: Okay, infomercials. So that became part of your strategy as well.
Jimmy: Yes, get it directly to the people. So make glasses with our patent on it, and then get it on TV, get it out to people.
Russ: Okay. We're gonna be back with more of this cool story with Jimmy Jongebloed, the Founder and CEO of Gripping Eyewear after this. You're listening to The BusinessMaker Show heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com.
[Aflac Commercial]
Russ: This is The BusinessMakers Show heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com. And continuing on with the Founder and CEO of Gripping Eyewear, Jimmy Jongebloed. Just a great, great story about having a cool patented eyewear idea and being sort of challenged and kept out of the industry until you started making your own product.
Jimmy: That's right. Making our own product was huge, making our own sunglasses, and then getting an infomercial together, a half hour show. Spent a lot of money doing it with the top people. And what that allowed us to do is we sold hundreds of thousands of glasses in the U.S. on about a $2 million ad budget. And then that launched us into what is now 14 countries and 7 other languages.
Russ: So you proved that the consumers want this.
Jimmy: People liked it, yeah, they liked the clip –
Russ: Okay, cool.
Jimmy: – they liked the deal, they liked the magnets, they liked the whole thing. And what that enabled us to do was to have credibility and go out and go get a name.
Russ: Get a name. Okay, tell us about that.
Jimmy: Well, we are incredibly fortunate and excited to be the first ever exclusive manufacturer and distributor of the Paris Hilton Sunglass Line.
Russ: Goodness gracious, mercy, mercy.
Jimmy: Yes.
Russ: Paris Hilton. So wait a minute, we're going from this haircut introduction to a person that you didn't know to signing up Paris Hilton to represent your product.
Jimmy: God bless America and everything she was founded on. Yes, it's amazing because just to give you some numbers, these are a publicly traded company, but they did an $80 million wholesale on Paris' perfume last year. So I got real interested in the license.
Russ: I would say so. So did you actually meet her then?
Jimmy: Yes, yeah, we've been working with her now since January 20th and been together, God, all over the world on several occasions. And she's incredible to work with, and has incredible taste and direction in sunglasses. So we had her up to New York for the big announcement at the Vision Expo East which is a – the second biggest eyewear show next to Milan.
Russ: Okay, did – do some of the same fellas from the Milan show go to New York?
Jimmy: Yeah, that's a great story. We had her at our booth signing autographs and taking pictures for three hours and then a big party at Bungalow 8 in New York, this really going club. And it's amazing how many of those same guys wanted invitations for their wife and cut in line to get Paris Hilton photographs.
Russ: You're kidding.
Jimmy: No.
Russ: You should have disallowed them actually, Jimmy.
Jimmy: No, no, no, no, no.
Russ: No, no, okay.
Jimmy: I'm all – now that they all want to potentially do deals with me, I'm all smiles and forgetfulness.
Russ: Is it likely if we were to see Paris Hilton with a set of sunglasses on they would be from your company?
Jimmy: Starting in September we're looking for – and right now we're working with several groups. I mean, you know, the likes of Macy's and Nordstrom's and Saks. We have two lines, gonna have a Signature line that's around $125.00 to $150.00 and then a Bridge line that we'll plan on doing the lions share of our business around 70 to 80 bucks.
Russ: Cool. Well, it just feels like, man, now you've got momentum that can't be stopped.
Jimmy: Well, the other significant thing is we signed our first licensing deal with Signature Eyewear.
Russ: Okay.
Jimmy: Which is about the eleventh largest maker in the world, and they're gonna put our magnets, it's gonna say, "With Gripping Eyewear technology," on Hummer eye gear, Cutter and Buck and Hummer Kids brands in the fall.
Russ: Goodness gracious. So and it sounds like everything is just panning out fine then.
Jimmy: Yeah, we're gonna be the fastest six year overnight success ever.
Russ: Well, congratulations on that. So tell us best case scenario now, I mean, it seems like it's playing out, but where would you like to see this five years from now?
Jimmy: I tell you what, I would love to have us have 8, 10 really good names that we're making the lines of and bothering the largest company in the world, Luxottica who paid $2.13 billion for Oakley.
Russ: Okay.
Jimmy: I'd like them to come be so bothered that they'd have to buy us and all of our patents for something.
Russ: That is cool, that's cool. All right, so before I let you go, let's say that we have an aspiring entrepreneur that's been tuned into this wild ride, and obviously there was some persistence along the way that played a huge role. But what sort of advice would you give to an aspiring entrepreneur?
Jimmy: Raise as much money as you can and certainly the beginning of what you're doing from individuals. Do not go after equity fund or firm or whatever. Just it's so difficult unless you can get it started by yourself.
Russ: Okay, great advice. Jimmy, I really appreciate you sharing your exciting story with us here.
Jimmy: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Russ: You bet. We've been talking with Jimmy Jongebloed, the Founder and CEO of Gripping Eyewear. And you're listening to The BusinessMaker Show heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com.
