Glass Cleaner Is a Modern Day David

¶ … Glass Cleaner is a modern day David and Goliath story centering around the question -- what happens if a product simply takes off in the modern marketplace? Brooks O'Kane is the owner of ClearVue Products, primarily the manufacturer of what is now a $4million business in the $160 million glass cleaning products industry. Through a series of lucky breaks and acumen for packaging and marketing, the ClearVue product has become predominant in the niche markets of automotive glass cleaning and grocery accounts. Of course, ClearVue must compete with the multibillion dollar nationals like Proctor and Gamble and Johnson. Most of ClearVue's successes centered around the nature of the product as a niche' preparation that consumers raved over -- and wrote prodigiously about their feelings. Brooks now has several decisions to make about his product -- including the opportunity to purchase Red Cross Nurses, a household cleaning product.

Option 1- Time for growth -- Brooks does some research about the RCN (Red Cross Nurse) disinfectant, which has been on the market in some permutation for more than 125 years. Unfortunately, the product has had little attention and annual revenues of only $200,000 (declining). The owner wants to retire and will sell the product line and trademark to Brooks. Brooks has experience with ClearVue being a virtual corporation, and has neither real desire nor impetus to purchase a manufacturing plant, set up his own large employee base, etc. However, he is quite skilled at packaging and product improvement/design. ClearVue already has the reputation of being an important niche market player, with skill and rising sales, so the addition of another product would not prove to a significant fiscal burden. That being said, ClearVue has a solid reputation in the grocery niche, which would be an easy entry for RCN with a new package. And, if we combine the expertise that Brooks has in guerilla marketing (newsletter, print stories, contests, etc.) is any indication, within a few months of repackaging, RCN would be on the upswing again. Because of the nature and circumstances of RCN, this might be an opportune time to pick up another line without expending much capital at all. In addition, it might be pleasantly challenging for Brooks to revamp and relaunch this line.

Option 2- With a $4 million dollar per annum business, Brooks is well-poised to glean funding and expand his operation to the point where he could be a serious contender for even more of the market share than he already has. This could be accomplished in several ways: Brooks could court venture capital and present a plan to manufacture, sell, and distribute a line of ClearVue products to the marketplace; with or without RCN. There could be various permutations of this idea:

A. Brooks could retain control and only get investor funding to purchase a building, manufacturing items, and distribution personnel. He would put together his own managerial team, but would need to promise a share of the earnings to the capital groups.

B. Brooks could put a merger/acquisition plan together with another niche player with similar pedigree and market share as ClearVue that potentially already has a building and manufacturing center, thus decreasing diffusion of stock options and retaining more control.

C. Brooks could retain control of a virtual organization, but would need to hire some marketing, promotion and legal help -- find investors or venture capital to expand his market with other products, or simply to focus on ClearVue and potentially RCN with a more aggressive enhanced penetration plan.