Ten years ago, Barbadian Sherwin Boyce set out to make a safe and useful tool to minimise or eliminate the danger of flying rocks and other debris for people who use weed whackers.
He invented Safe Cuts, a lawn maintenance screen akin to “a temporary fence”, made with a protective mesh and three telescoping poles.
“These poles sit on tripod legs that can be adjusted to make the netting level with the grassy area. The nylon mesh netting comes out ten feet on either side, then the legs very simply and securely fasten into the ground. When not in use, it retracts inside the two end posts for convenience. The temporary fence has a quick set up time and can be compactly stored in its own storage case,” he told BARBADOS BUSINESS AUTHORITY.
“I would have initially done this in 2005-2006. I entered it in the national innovation competition and I got to the semi-finals. I wasn’t happy about that and I entered it the next year and it also placed in the semi-finals. This is against the backdrop of having reached the finals of the inaugural competition back in 2002-2003 with a different invention called pack a barrel.”
The original concept, said the former soldier, was to have a bomb blast net to “capture any debris for first responders, something like a Kevlar device which would be placed around a suspected device to help cushion any projectiles that would fly out”. But the St Leonard’s Boys’ Secondary School alumnus said that after failing to get any “push or tug in the market” he put it aside after a couple of years.
He continued to pursue his dream to bring the invention from an idea to a product and today, after receiving the patent, he is trying to get the US$30 000 required to build the prototype.
“If you don’t have funds, if you don’t have a backer, if you’re just a raw innovator who has an idea which technically makes sense but if you don’t have the funds you’re not going to get anywhere,” he added.
This is when he opted for crowdfunding.
“I started to research crowdfunding and the benefits entrepreneurs can gain without having to go through the normal red tape with banks and [other organisations]. This would have come after I was still going through the Small Business Association in terms of having them assist me with the patent but that request was denied. I had to go at it myself…but it is a fairly expensive process.”
“…As an inventor, if you don’t have a prototype it is very difficult. There’s interest in the product but I would need to get that prototype to go further with those persons. The crowdfunding aspect is to raise enough funds to build the prototype which is expensive.
“After I get this done, there is an eight to nine-month period for taking it through the testing phases and building and manufacturing the product and then it goes out to market,” he added.
Boyce said crowdfunding “is basically asking a lot of people for a small donation for a product that you have. I have it out there on the Internet where it is gaining a bit of traction, but not enough”.
While the people who are interested in the product are primarily from “parts of Europe” and the United States who work in the landscaping industry or highway maintenance, Boyce noted it was geared towards people in the Caribbean.
“The countries in the Caribbean who do highway maintenance use weed whackers, not lawnmowers….I really wanted to be patriotic and have it done in Barbados”.
During the interview from Tobago where he works and lives with his wife and two children, he stated that after researching the best materials to use, the “fairly complicated mechanism”, among other things, he engaged industrial designers in Silicon Valley in order to get the pending patent status.
They will build the Safe Cut prototype but he disclosed that his intention was to manufacture them in Asia where it is less expensive.
“It can work. The engineers I’ve spoken to in the US showed it can, but only when the manufacturing starts and the tinkering starts then you would know exactly how big it is supposed to be,” the inventor said.
“The reward-based crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo.com will go live soon, and contributors will be pre-ordering the product which should be delivered within 59 months after it goes through the various stages. “Perks” are chosen based on the quantum of the contribution with the top three referrals having a chance to win tourism and Barbados-related prizes.
“It is a lot of hard work but once I’ve laid the groundwork, I believe we will be successful,” said Boyce. (Green Bananas Media.)
