TRIPLE VISION TEES OFF

Launching a new inventive product on a worldwide stage, Niamh MacSweeney speaks to three up and coming, award winning businessmen and discovers that their hard work is paying off and their innovative golf cleaning product is proving very fruitful indeed

When Irish Entrepreneur ran a Prove Your Idea Competition last year we could not have anticipated that a few months later the winners, three young budding entrepreneurs, would have been propelled to such dizzy heights of success.

Founders of VVVisions, Andrew Thompson, James Dowling and Brendan Moore proved the potential of their innovative golf cleaning product and impressed the competition judges who chose VVVisions as the overall winners of the competition based on their products high level of innovativeness, creativity and originality, understanding of commercial reality and overall potential for long-term success.

INNOVATIVE DESIGN

Avid golfers themselves, the inventive entrepreneurs were disappointed with current golf club designs which they felt didn’t compensate for dirt that gets lodged in the groves of irons resulting in a loss of spin and ball control, two fundamentals of the sport. To counter this issue the VVVisions team came up with the inventive idea to develop a golfing product that removes all the dirt and debris from the entire golf club head.

The V-Towel, as it is known, combines the latest advancements in bristle technology with a modified and pioneering golf towel. According to the emerging entrepreneurs the two piece cleaning system supplies all the functions of a standard golf towel with the added advantage of cleaning the entire clubface and cavities in one easy step. The V-Towel was designed with golfers in mind and the trio maintain their product is both functionally and aesthetically superior to anything else on the market.

BRANDING OPPORTUNITIES

Not only is the product design revolutionary, but the V-Towel uses a form of bag attachment which ensures that even when the bag is at an extreme angle, the towel will always hang vertically. This clever design element not only benefits the golfer but also VVVisions, who fully utilise and exploit their branding space because the product is always visible to other golfers.

Although the three young businessmen are clearly on to a winner, when they first began conceptualising the product they were faced with some stumbling blocks that had to be overcome. Initially they were wary about disclosing their idea for fear that it would be taken from them. More challenging though was their endeavours to prove the products viability, their own business acumen and to be taken seriously. Brendan Moore, the companies Commercial Director explains, “at the beginning we didn’t know how to bring a product from start to finish. People saw the fresh young faces and didn’t believe in us because we were so young.” Many people VVVisions approached with the idea thought the three young men would be here today and gone tomorrow, however this could not have been further from the truth and surely there are some people kicking themselves for not taking a chance or see the prospects in the idea.

A MARRIAGE OF MINDS

One person who did believed in the business concept was Michael Kelly from Carlow Enterprise Board, who was instrumental to the initiation of the project. The VVVisions team also found a young dynamic design team, Dolmen Industrial Design who instantly saw the potential and viability of the V-Towel. “The initial conceptualisation patent was an ongoing process. All our ideas were implemented and so it was a very fruitful relationship with the designers which has led us to develop our portfolio further with three other products, the V-Towel Elite, the V-Towel Face2Face and the V-Towel Face2Face Pro,” explains Andrew Thompson, the companies Product Developer.

With the project in full swing, Financial Controller, James Dowling does however recall that the whole process took longer to materialise than they expected and was a huge learning curve for them all. “You are way out of your depth starting off, but then you are learning all the time, about patenting, about designing the product and getting the product manufactured - it’s a whole new process at every stage,” Dowling concedes.

Once the prototype was designed Moore explains that Duncan McInnes was brought on board with the responsibility of getting the design to manufacture. McInnes, who brought along a number of trusted suppliers with him, advised the entrepreneurs to manufacture the towel in China.

Thompson says that by associating themselves with the right people they have significantly lowered the possibility of the business failing. “As young guys with no experience, we went by what felt right for us and we took our time. The drive to really see something through to the very end matched with seasoned professionals is what has really accelerated the growth of our business,” he says.

ATTRACTING INVESTORS

With orders for the V-Towel flooding in the time is now right for VVVision to look at finding investors. “We were holding onto our equity for as long as we could but now we are working on structuring a deal that will be the best equity opportunity for us,” Dowling reveals. With a number of offers on the table at the moment they are holding off until they have a few more orders so that the business is even more attractive to potential investors and also so that they can afford to give away less equity.

The three business smarts are under no illusion that they will eventually have to relinquish some of the equity of the business, especially if they are to fully realise their goal and launch an international sporting brand onto the market and achieve global brand recognition. According to Moore, “that is why we have outsourced the design and manufacturing of the product. We are always striving to add value to the business and one thing about working with professionals and outsourcing is that the business is very scalable and if we want to ramp up production it is only a matter of informing the manufacturers in China and that is very important to us.”

LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE

So has inventing a product with genuine market appeal and realising the dream of getting a product from concept to market exceeded their expectations. The three answer with a resounding yes. Even though they have endured and survived a crash course in product design, manufacturing and marketing, the young entrepreneurs have come out as clear winners. Moore admits, “this steep learning curve has given us a different focus and a different view and we have a degree of maturity beyond our years because of the responsibility we have.” “Because we had so little experience at the beginning we asked a lot more questions, so you can gain a lot more and you grow up very quickly. The harder we work and the more we put in the luckier we get,” Thompson enthuses. While Dowling concludes, “even if this venture failed we have the skills that we have learnt, which we can apply to the next project, because it is the same skill set that you can apply to something else in the future.”

Published in the December 2007 / January 2008 Issue of Irish Entrepreneur