Raise money from friends and family with 12% APY loans

Use the money to get a patent, design a high quality kickstarter, and launch it. Pay for ads to get > $3k in orders.

Assess after kickstarter. Is it successful? Calculate $x advertising -> $x+y

Can ads create a positive ROI? If so, it is a successful business model and can be expanded.

Use $ to expand manufacturing capability and get ready to sell on Amazon.

Use loan $ to advertise on Amazon, Google, YouTube, and social media. Use profits to scale accordingly.

Be receptive to feedback and improve product as necessary. Meet with Ace Hardware to start getting the product in stores. Learn from that experience. See how well it does in stores and listen to feedback.

Do what is necessary to expand into other stores (Lowe’s, Home Depot, Walmart).

Learn from the best business leaders throughout history: put the customer first, listen to feedback, adapt to changing conditions, make good partnerships, act honorably and generously and clients and employees will respect you and develop positive associations with your brand. Create a high quality product and service at a fair value, and one can succeed. We are here to provide a service to humanity (as silly as it sounds, it is true).

The goal isn’t to make money or dominate the market. We are offering a superior product at a higher price. Not everyone will resonate with that. However, some will, esp. property managers and commercial enterprises who see the value in saving time. If it costs someone +$100 to hire someone to fix a leaky toilet, they will be wise to insist on paying $10 more for a superior product that lasts x10 as long. Word will get out.

Recently, people are getting annoyed by Temu and that style of business strategy. It has been spreading on Amazon and Etsy etc- a kind of race to the bottom. It is annoying when things aren’t advertised correctly and don’t work well. Some of us have gotten used to sending cheap things back; back and forth back and forth, as if somehow multiple trips back and forth to the post office to return cheap junk is more convenient than how things used to be. It used to be that false advertising was such a horrible crime (that was often enforced) that few dared. Now, when a store gets below 4 stars, they just close down and reopen online under a new name. Now, many businesses take the strategy of getting things out fast and sloppy and then lean on the generosity of Amazon returns. It still leaves a bad impression on many customers, however. It feels shady and dishonest and doesn’t honor the time wasted by the customer. Some people still value high quality products and integrity in how a business conducts itself. This is starting to sound like grandpa get-off-my-lawn, but you get the idea: there is a small niche market of people who will value this product. There are still some companies who care about reputation and don’t want to rely on “spin the wheel to see what discount you will get!” gimmicks.

It will take time to get the word out, and that’s ok. We want to expand slowly so that the profits can pay for increased manufacturing ability. We’d like to keep it manufactured in the USA. We will need to expand fairly quickly, however. It is reasonable to assume that cheap, copycat products will be on the market within a year. After that point, we may be competing against similar products at lower prices. So this first year is key to fix any issues with the product, develop a good following online, a happy customer base, and expand into physical stores before others do.

Many new toilets use a piston system instead of a flapper, and so it is possible that after getting into physical stores, there will be a big bump in sales, but then sales will slow down over time and the flapper may eventually go extinct. We will adjust as necessary, perhaps offering high quality toilets one day, or high-end pressurized toilet kits, building off a brand name that people trust.