Business Opportunities Weblog

June 5, 2010 by Rich Whittle | 1 Comment

According to Entrepreneur.com, as owner of Moman Sales, a South Florida specialist in plastic flowers, what Matt Moman knows is fake flora.

In June 2007, Moman was on a business trip to San Francisco, checking out the latest in nature’s plastics, when he hit on the citrus creations of Winward International. The lemons and limes looked and felt so real, Moman was convinced there had to be another way to market them.

A few days later, back home sipping a beer, it came to him: The limes would be a perfect match for the Corona brand.

Enter “the limer,” or as it is officially known, the New Corona Extra Lime Bottle Opener. It’s a simple gizmo: a bottle opener embedded in a plastic lime, with a built-in magnet made for sticking to the fridge.

Yet, it’s irresistible–it cups perfectly in the palm of your hand, it effortlessly pops the cap and, with a little practice, you can even catch the cap on the magnet.

Moman began making crude prototypes in his garage, then asked Winward, of Union City, Calif., to help with the project. “We went back and forth and determined what we wanted, and I went ahead and filed for a patent,” he says.

By summer of 2008, he was ready to pitch Corona, with nothing more than a pre-production sample and his pending patent. “Fortunately,” Moman says, “once they saw it, they totally got it.” Seven months after he filed his patent, he got his contract, which is expected to net him millions.

“The lime opener has proven to be a fantastic addition to our line of promotional and novelty products,” says James Valles, national project manager of Grupo Modelo. “Sales of the lime opener have doubled within the grocery channel over the last few months with no signs of letting up.”

Photo by Entrepreneur.com.

In Inventions | 1 Comment
Tags: Beverage, Niche