Litter-Robot

“One was from our, the competitor litter made. And if I recall, I think it was a number around 200,000 to buy the patents.”

“Most of the retailers wanted 50 points on the product and there just wasn't a way that we could Provide that. We were maybe making 30 points at most on the product at the time.”

“We studied this, and we found out that what it would cost us to ship the product from overseas to our warehouse is what it would cost us to assemble it locally.”

“We were into e-commerce very early, just kind of by necessity due to the size of the product, and we didn't have a lot of margin in the product either.”

“I mean, we would have certainly taken more volume if we could have gotten it, but it was kind of a blessing that the volumes were low because it allowed us to kind of take our time and learn and to adjust some things about the product.”

“Without a bank loan, without, you know, investors, I was actually able to retool the product by amortizing the cost of the tooling with one supplier that I worked with, and then I was able to take out a loan A two-year loan at 12% interest with another supplie…”

“You know, the building, the product we did that in Pontiac, Michigan for a while, and I was actually the sole assembler for probably the first three or four months.”

“The litter maid was, and again, not to trash them or anything, but it was a very literal approach to the problem. But, It doesn't really break down into its functions and, you know, how can we best solve this problem? And that's what I tried to do. I tried to …”

“2004 was the first year that we hit a million dollars, and that was a huge milestone for us.”

“By 2010, we had sold probably about 40 to 50,000 units.”