Andre Nel

Andre Nel

Andre Nel is the inventor of the Bagelpod.

He has business, engineering and science background.
He has an interest in mysticism, how it relates to new discoveries in the science of physics, cognitive ability and personal development.

We bring you his experience in the Invention Biz ( from the original article posted on:http://ezinearticles.com/?My-Experience-in-the-Invention-Biz&id=3237481 )

To know more or to purchase the Bagel pod please visit http://www.newdavincis.com/bagelpodslicerusacustomersonly-p-808.html

Bagelpod

Bagelpod

Introduction
In 1996, many changes occurred simultaneously in my life. My marriage of nearly 17 years ended unexpectedly. In addition, the company I worked for was sending not-so-subtle messages concerning future job prospects.
In addition, the company I worked for was continuously outsourcing internal company functions. There was less and less going on in the company and more and more going out. I thought if they could outsource, I could also outsource. I could come up with an ingenious idea and out source production. I could then engineer, manufacture, distribute, and market my own product without all the inefficiencies and unfairness associated with a large semi-permanent infrastructure. It sounded so simple.
Prior Proper Preparation Prevents Poor Performance
To prepare myself for the transition, I attended many meetings of a local inventor’s group. At these meetings, so-called successful inventors would give presentations. What was very noticeable was that most of the presenters had business backgrounds and most of the audience had engineering backgrounds. Also noticeable was that many of the successful inventors aggressively marketed their products to the audience. These products were usually in the form of inventor courses. It made me wonder how much of their revenue came from their invention and how much came from the inventor courses. In any case, I decided I needed to get an education in business. Shortly after this, the company sponsored a program to allow employees to work towards earning two masters degrees simultaneously at the company’s expense. One of the degrees was an “MBA” the other a “Masters in Science and Engineering”. The latter degree has to do with the management of science and engineering programs and projects. I completed the program and earned the two degrees. It was worth going through the program. However, neither degree completely prepared me for launching my product. As Harry Truman once said, “It is what you learn after you know it all that really counts.” It was humbling to find out how much I did not know and I had a lot to be humble about. I began to feel that the MBA I had earned stood for “Master of Barely Anything”.
About 6 months after I earned my degrees the company offered me a buy-out package. I accepted it to launch my own company and here is the story. I offer it in the hopes that it may help someone considering inventing and marketing their own product.
The Product
I had spent 23 years as a hands-on engineer. What I mean by that is that I built many complex systems involving many disciplines of engineering single-handedly. I had the opportunity to do electrical, mechanical and software engineering. I also made many of the components and coded the software. I was working in a materials characterization laboratory and building custom measurement equipment. At this time, there was not a lot of standardization. Therefore, my designs were not constrained by standards. Now, because of standardization of computers, operating systems and software, most designs must work within the standards. Because of this, I decided to do a low-tech product. In addition, a low-tech product would be easier to manage and sell than a high-tech product. My wife suggested as a low-tech kitchen product a bagel slicer. She did not like the current set of available products. I took down her complaints and made them my design criteria. The design criteria list is now the features and benefits list of the marketed product.
Prototypes
I had learned how to use CAD software so creating a design was not a big problem, although, my skills with the CAD software were not that great. I had learned them on my own and some of my methods were very cumbersome since I did not know about many of the software features. Anyhow, I came up with a design for the prototype. I bought some cheap woodworking equipment to make parts of the prototype. I had the metal blades of the product water-jet cut out of sheet steel. To sharpen the blades, I bought a small cheap mill and a rotary table. I had to sharpen the blades through a very tedious process. My back and legs ached after spending hours hunched over the mill doing a repetitive mind-numbing chore. However, I preserved and got the job done. I put the model together and found my first oversight – I had the blades pivoting in holes. The holes kept the blades from moving at all. The blades needed to pivot in slots. As they say “Back to the drawing board…” I fixed the problem by changing the holes to slots and finished building the prototype.
The Test
After I finished putting the prototype together, I postponed testing it for over a week. I was dreading the test. I was afraid that the thing would not work. Finally, I steeled my nerves and forced myself to conduct the test. I bought some bagels and tested the thing. It worked! After the test, I took a long nap. The sudden release of the tension had drained me of energy.
More Prototypes
After the first prototype test proved the concept, I was more inclined to spend some more money on a more finished product. I put the CAD files in a Stereo Lithography (STL) format and got a quote for rapid prototyping. It still amazes me that I could upload the files and receive a quote instantaneously. I paid for the prototype using a credit card and I had my parts 3 days later. It had taken me weeks to make the first set of prototype components. There was no escaping the drudgery of sharpening the blades though. I had the metal cut using a laser cutter this time but I still had to spend hours at the mill sharpening each an every tooth. Testing the second prototype was not as scary as testing the first one. I had proven the concept and that was a relief. I had it working once and I was sure I could make it work again.
Industrial Design
After the second prototype, I had an industrial design firm work on the aesthetics and manufacturability issues. The first two prototypes were rather crude looking. The design firm initially quoted a cost of $6000 and a period of 4 weeks. It wound up costing over $18,000 and took 9 months. This is my fault because I did not hold their feet to the fire on costs or time. I was new at this and was still learning. I also discovered that the design firm charged me $15 to sign for a package I sent them and $30 to watch a 30-second video critique I emailed. In addition, we had tried for months to get them to alter the design. They kept making alterations but not the ones specified. They, of course, would charge for the unspecified changes. I kick myself for not hollering then. I have developed a backbone since then. Another lesson learned…
Branding
While the industrial designed was in process, a contract graphics designer was hired. The time for the work specified in the contract as two weeks. However, as two weeks stretched to four, then six and finally eight, I terminated the contract and received only part of the contracted work. We contracted with another graphics design firm. In the end, the packaging design we received was too flimsy to use. In addition, the color scheme had placed white printing on a yellow background that was unreadable. It cost around $14,000 total for the graphics design work. However, I discovered how to do my own package designs using PhotoShop. Fortunately, I was able to do my own designs for around $900.
Manufacturing
We started out manufacturing with one company. We paid initial tooling costs of around $4,500 for plastic injection molds. The deal was that the reduced tooling costs were because we were to have the same company manufacture the product. If we wanted to manufacture the product elsewhere, we could purchase the tooling for another $4,500. Things did not work out that way. The company had serious problems with quality. They also had problems making the blades. Therefore, despite our efforts to resolve the problems we had to move our manufacturing. The company then raised the residual costs to release the tooling to over $20,000. We walked away and made other arrangements. Fortunately, I was able to find a reputable manufacturer.
Adjustments
In manufacturing this product, we had to make several adjustments. One was the packaging mentioned above. We also adjusted the shipping and vendor packaging. In addition to the packaging, we redesigned blades and developed a method for sharpening them. Both the blade design and the sharpening method are patent pending. Further, we developed elastic grips to keep from crushing bagels and handle a wider range of bagel sizes.
Quality
We had some missteps along the way. After we fixed all the design and packaging, we encountered quality problems. We scrapped first batch of inventory because the blades were improperly hardened. We focused on all the new stuff required to make the blades, new design, new sharpening method, new automated equipment and overlooked a standard part of the process. We had neglected the standard chemical hardening process. We have corrected this problem.
There is a lot to developing a new product. You need to train personnel, develop, and debug the machines and processes. The goal is too shoot for less than 1%. However, it is unavoidable some defective product will get to the customer. Quality is not something that can be set and then neglected. I think a good policy is to replace any defective product at no additional costs to the customer. I also think it is a good idea to look at customer reviews, feedback, and refunds for problems. I have contacted customers to find out what the problem was and made my best effort to fix it.
I had to steel my nerves the first couple of times. Nevertheless, I have found if you make an honest effort to fix the problem that customers are happy. Companies trying to correct customer problems are rare today. It amazes me how many companies ignore customer impromptu feedback and yet send a survey. For example, I have bought something, had a problem and done a Web search to find hundreds of postings on the same problem with the company selling the product offering no solution.
We seem to have quality under control but we are still continually monitoring for signs on trouble and make our best effort to resolve problems to the customer’s satisfaction.
Marketing
I am least comfortable with this area than any other part of the new product development process. In all the other areas, if you have a problem it is easy to make adjustments and see the effects. In marketing, effects take a while and are statistical in nature. What may turn off one buyer may attract another. In addition, to be honest some of the techniques used seem to border on or are outright manipulation.
To make matters worse there is a legion of marketers aggressively marketing to would-be marketers. Most make exaggerated claims about results. I have asked about conversion rates (ratio of sales to campaign size) and have not gotten satisfying answers.
In addition, I think some of the methods used tend to just badger. I want announce the product to a wide audience without resorting to some of the techniques I see used by many. The unfortunate thing is that I suspect some of these bad tactics may actually work on some level. I certainly get repeated solicitations in many forms for the same product.
I have tried various approaches pay-per-click, search engine optimization, and opt-in email campaigns with less than satisfying results. However, I am continuing to experiment….
Conclusion
I took a chance on developing my own product and to be honest things have not gone according to plan. I do not mean that in a bad way either. In the process of making the journey, I have developed skills and improved. This project had significantly contributed to my development as a human being. I would do it again – with some changes-but I would still go for it!

Introduction

In 1996, many changes occurred simultaneously in my life. My marriage of nearly 17 years ended unexpectedly. In addition, the company I worked for was sending not-so-subtle messages concerning future job prospects.

In addition, the company I worked for was continuously outsourcing internal company functions. There was less and less going on in the company and more and more going out. I thought if they could outsource, I could also outsource. I could come up with an ingenious idea and out source production. I could then engineer, manufacture, distribute, and market my own product without all the inefficiencies and unfairness associated with a large semi-permanent infrastructure. It sounded so simple.

Prior Proper Preparation Prevents Poor Performance

To prepare myself for the transition, I attended many meetings of a local inventor’s group. At these meetings, so-called successful inventors would give presentations. What was very noticeable was that most of the presenters had business backgrounds and most of the audience had engineering backgrounds. Also noticeable was that many of the successful inventors aggressively marketed their products to the audience. These products were usually in the form of inventor courses. It made me wonder how much of their revenue came from their invention and how much came from the inventor courses. In any case, I decided I needed to get an education in business. Shortly after this, the company sponsored a program to allow employees to work towards earning two masters degrees simultaneously at the company’s expense. One of the degrees was an “MBA” the other a “Masters in Science and Engineering”. The latter degree has to do with the management of science and engineering programs and projects. I completed the program and earned the two degrees. It was worth going through the program. However, neither degree completely prepared me for launching my product. As Harry Truman once said, “It is what you learn after you know it all that really counts.” It was humbling to find out how much I did not know and I had a lot to be humble about. I began to feel that the MBA I had earned stood for “Master of Barely Anything”.

About 6 months after I earned my degrees the company offered me a buy-out package. I accepted it to launch my own company and here is the story. I offer it in the hopes that it may help someone considering inventing and marketing their own product.

The Product

Bagelpod

Bagelpod

I had spent 23 years as a hands-on engineer. What I mean by that is that I built many complex systems involving many disciplines of engineering single-handedly. I had the opportunity to do electrical, mechanical and software engineering. I also made many of the components and coded the software. I was working in a materials characterization laboratory and building custom measurement equipment. At this time, there was not a lot of standardization. Therefore, my designs were not constrained by standards. Now, because of standardization of computers, operating systems and software, most designs must work within the standards. Because of this, I decided to do a low-tech product. In addition, a low-tech product would be easier to manage and sell than a high-tech product. My wife suggested as a low-tech kitchen product a bagel slicer. She did not like the current set of available products. I took down her complaints and made them my design criteria. The design criteria list is now the features and benefits list of the marketed product.

Prototypes

I had learned how to use CAD software so creating a design was not a big problem, although, my skills with the CAD software were not that great. I had learned them on my own and some of my methods were very cumbersome since I did not know about many of the software features. Anyhow, I came up with a design for the prototype. I bought some cheap woodworking equipment to make parts of the prototype. I had the metal blades of the product water-jet cut out of sheet steel. To sharpen the blades, I bought a small cheap mill and a rotary table. I had to sharpen the blades through a very tedious process. My back and legs ached after spending hours hunched over the mill doing a repetitive mind-numbing chore. However, I preserved and got the job done. I put the model together and found my first oversight – I had the blades pivoting in holes. The holes kept the blades from moving at all. The blades needed to pivot in slots. As they say “Back to the drawing board…” I fixed the problem by changing the holes to slots and finished building the prototype.

The Test

After I finished putting the prototype together, I postponed testing it for over a week. I was dreading the test. I was afraid that the thing would not work. Finally, I steeled my nerves and forced myself to conduct the test. I bought some bagels and tested the thing. It worked! After the test, I took a long nap. The sudden release of the tension had drained me of energy.

More Prototypes

After the first prototype test proved the concept, I was more inclined to spend some more money on a more finished product. I put the CAD files in a Stereo Lithography (STL) format and got a quote for rapid prototyping. It still amazes me that I could upload the files and receive a quote instantaneously. I paid for the prototype using a credit card and I had my parts 3 days later. It had taken me weeks to make the first set of prototype components. There was no escaping the drudgery of sharpening the blades though. I had the metal cut using a laser cutter this time but I still had to spend hours at the mill sharpening each an every tooth. Testing the second prototype was not as scary as testing the first one. I had proven the concept and that was a relief. I had it working once and I was sure I could make it work again.

Industrial Design

After the second prototype, I had an industrial design firm work on the aesthetics and manufacturability issues. The first two prototypes were rather crude looking. The design firm initially quoted a cost of $6000 and a period of 4 weeks. It wound up costing over $18,000 and took 9 months. This is my fault because I did not hold their feet to the fire on costs or time. I was new at this and was still learning. I also discovered that the design firm charged me $15 to sign for a package I sent them and $30 to watch a 30-second video critique I emailed. In addition, we had tried for months to get them to alter the design. They kept making alterations but not the ones specified. They, of course, would charge for the unspecified changes. I kick myself for not hollering then. I have developed a backbone since then. Another lesson learned…

Branding

While the industrial designed was in process, a contract graphics designer was hired. The time for the work specified in the contract as two weeks. However, as two weeks stretched to four, then six and finally eight, I terminated the contract and received only part of the contracted work. We contracted with another graphics design firm. In the end, the packaging design we received was too flimsy to use. In addition, the color scheme had placed white printing on a yellow background that was unreadable. It cost around $14,000 total for the graphics design work. However, I discovered how to do my own package designs using PhotoShop. Fortunately, I was able to do my own designs for around $900.

Manufacturing

Bagelpod

Bagelpod

We started out manufacturing with one company. We paid initial tooling costs of around $4,500 for plastic injection molds. The deal was that the reduced tooling costs were because we were to have the same company manufacture the product. If we wanted to manufacture the product elsewhere, we could purchase the tooling for another $4,500. Things did not work out that way. The company had serious problems with quality. They also had problems making the blades. Therefore, despite our efforts to resolve the problems we had to move our manufacturing. The company then raised the residual costs to release the tooling to over $20,000. We walked away and made other arrangements. Fortunately, I was able to find a reputable manufacturer.

Adjustments

In manufacturing this product, we had to make several adjustments. One was the packaging mentioned above. We also adjusted the shipping and vendor packaging. In addition to the packaging, we redesigned blades and developed a method for sharpening them. Both the blade design and the sharpening method are patent pending. Further, we developed elastic grips to keep from crushing bagels and handle a wider range of bagel sizes.

Quality

We had some missteps along the way. After we fixed all the design and packaging, we encountered quality problems. We scrapped first batch of inventory because the blades were improperly hardened. We focused on all the new stuff required to make the blades, new design, new sharpening method, new automated equipment and overlooked a standard part of the process. We had neglected the standard chemical hardening process. We have corrected this problem.

There is a lot to developing a new product. You need to train personnel, develop, and debug the machines and processes. The goal is too shoot for less than 1%. However, it is unavoidable some defective product will get to the customer. Quality is not something that can be set and then neglected. I think a good policy is to replace any defective product at no additional costs to the customer. I also think it is a good idea to look at customer reviews, feedback, and refunds for problems. I have contacted customers to find out what the problem was and made my best effort to fix it.

I had to steel my nerves the first couple of times. Nevertheless, I have found if you make an honest effort to fix the problem that customers are happy. Companies trying to correct customer problems are rare today. It amazes me how many companies ignore customer impromptu feedback and yet send a survey. For example, I have bought something, had a problem and done a Web search to find hundreds of postings on the same problem with the company selling the product offering no solution.

We seem to have quality under control but we are still continually monitoring for signs on trouble and make our best effort to resolve problems to the customer’s satisfaction.

Marketing

I am least comfortable with this area than any other part of the new product development process. In all the other areas, if you have a problem it is easy to make adjustments and see the effects. In marketing, effects take a while and are statistical in nature. What may turn off one buyer may attract another. In addition, to be honest some of the techniques used seem to border on or are outright manipulation.

To make matters worse there is a legion of marketers aggressively marketing to would-be marketers. Most make exaggerated claims about results. I have asked about conversion rates (ratio of sales to campaign size) and have not gotten satisfying answers.

In addition, I think some of the methods used tend to just badger. I want announce the product to a wide audience without resorting to some of the techniques I see used by many. The unfortunate thing is that I suspect some of these bad tactics may actually work on some level. I certainly get repeated solicitations in many forms for the same product.

I have tried various approaches pay-per-click, search engine optimization, and opt-in email campaigns with less than satisfying results. However, I am continuing to experiment….

Conclusion

I took a chance on developing my own product and to be honest things have not gone according to plan. I do not mean that in a bad way either. In the process of making the journey, I have developed skills and improved. This project had significantly contributed to my development as a human being. I would do it again – with some changes-but I would still go for it!

To know more or to purchase the Bagel pod please visithttp://www.newdavincis.com/bagelpodslicerusacustomersonly-p-808.html

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