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INNOVATION RESOURCES

Angel Mop

Breakthrough:
Sponge mop with patented flexible ends to clean floor and baseboards simultaneously.

Inventor:
Kathy Cioci , United States

Financial reward:
$100,000+

The Story:

According to inventor Kathy Cioci she’s come up with the first innovation in the domestic cleaning industry for over a decade. Angel Mop is a convertible cleaning gadget with flexible wings. The patented “Angel Wings” flip up 90 degrees making it possible to simultaneously clean the floor and baseboards.

Cioci, a mother of eight, was tired of stooping down on her hands and knees to get her home looking spic and span and so she went shopping for a mop that would clean floor and baseboards at the same time and make her life easier.

Nine-Year Inventing Journey

Surprised that nothing could fulfill her cleaning needs she started to develop her own product. It turned out to be a nine-year journey that involved many prototypes, and just as many, if not more naysayers and negative comments from skeptics.

However, the Angel Mop has received widespread critical acclaim. It won the 2006 INPEX (Invention & New Product Exposition) Woman Inventor of the Year award, and was listed in the top 10 products from over 6,000 submissions to the QVC/Oprah search for inventions contest in 2007.

Product Development

Cioci sketched out a few ideas and when she was ready to prototype approached her local university and they referred to her an affiliate program that carries out prototyping. It was not a smooth process.

Prototype Problems

She was in the engineer’s office with the finished prototype preparing for the final test. However, when she put the mop into a squeegee position it didn’t squeeze the sponge all the way. The inventor was adamant that she wasn’t going to let an inferior product out into the world and so it was back to drawing board. The entire design was scrapped and she had to start from the very beginning. She hired another engineer and a new design was developed.

It took 9 prototypes and a patient and tenacious mold maker to get the final product.

To find a manufacturer she attended the Chicago Home and Housewares trade show and browsed the stands to talk to different outfits.

Negativity

What surprised Cioci about the inventing process was the discouragement in the beginning; not from her family and friends but others who she would talk to about her idea. But her passion for her brainwave was not diminished; she was sure she had hit onto a winner and so to receive affirmation and feedback from professionals started to enter contests.

Product Launch

The official launch of Angel Mop was in the fall of 2009 and it coincided with an appearance on the shopping channel QVC. But even before this key date her innovation was picking up favorable press at trade shows and some of those inventor contests including a place in the semi-finals in Hammacher/Schlemmer’s 10th Annual Search for Inventors.

Overall Cioci estimates that she’s invested $200,000 to navigate the twists and turns of inventing and get Angel Mop to market. It is currently sold through her website and QVC. She is also sending out samples to home catalogues and direct TV companies, as well as dealing with other issues of running her company such as warehousing and shipping.

The inventor’s journey is often a lonely and daunting one especially for the newbie, but Cioci found invaluable help from the pages of her dog-eared copy of The Mom Inventors Handbook. The feeling of pride in her achievement is enormous and she found the process so worthwhile that she’s now thinking of Angel Mop spin-off products.

[NEXT STORY]Article by: Paul Arnold

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