YOU INVENTED IT. NOW WHAT?

Guest post by: Thomas J. Madden
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IS BIGGER BETTER IN PR? - By Thomas J. Madden

Down deep in my gut, I never thought my invention would turn into such a profitable business. It started out almost as a joke. Friends teased me on the silly superficiality of my gag-like invention, the Knife and ForkLift. But combining creativity with publicity often can have explosive results for entrepreneurs.

Despite the kidding I encountered, I wondered if my invention might have a far weightier significance to our growing society? Could it actually help reduce the skyrocketing cost of healthcare from all those calories we send down the rapids of our throats into America's ever expanding stomachs, that wind up eventually in Lake Obesity where one in three overweight Americans are today heading full speed?

So I built a website and had my PR firm, TransMedia Group, put out some news releases. From the media reaction, it was obvious I had struck a chord. In an interview early on with a radio station in Dublin, Ireland, I was half joking that the cost of our healthcare is skyrocketing because we’re constantly being a attacked by calories from overeating, which is why I invented the Knife and ForkLift as a defensive weapons to slow us down the invasion.

Then suddenly something that started out as a zany novelty item of knives and forks sticking out of 1.5 lb dumbbells turned into my own personal business stimulus package. TransMedia Group got the product on national TV shows like NBC TODAY SHOW and ELLEN DEGENERES, plus write-ups in LA TIMES and FITNESS MAGAZINE. In an amazingly short time, Knife and Forklift became a brand and thousands of people hungry for weight loss beelined to our website to find out more about a product that could help them eat less and maybe unclog arteries across America and slim down our bulging society. Are you reading this, Mr. Obama? Sales took off.

Imagine, Mr. President, a society as thin as you are? That exercises restraint at table? A de-stimulus package to lessen our food intake? Would that not have a significant impact on the health of our Nation? Looking at you, I’ll bet you’re not a speed eater, unlike most Americans who should get a speeding ticket for eating too fast.

To make my story and in effect my product more attractive and newsworthy, I began to speak more colorfully about our fast food culture. I said in interviews:"the way we Americans wolf down our food, our digestive tracts have become race tracks."

So maybe Mr. Obama, you should be exhorting fellow Americans to eat slower with Knife and Forklift, to which I just added a Spoonlift?

Eating fast all my life and watching others gulp their food like there’s no tomorrow got me to thinking that America’s obesity and related health problems may not be so much a consequence of what we’re eating, but how fast we’re shoveling it down. Certainly acid reflux is a result of racing to the fast food finish line.

So just like we set speed limits on our roads and highways, I devised a way to remind and encourage people to eat more safely under the speed limit. Just like getting Americans to slow down on highways helps to save lives, anything that slows them down at the dinner table has the same result.

That’s because it’s pretty well established that eating more slowly allows that crucial message that you’re full to reach your brain before too much collateral damage occurs to your body from overeating. So why not make eating more difficult to do, put some training wheels on your eating and connect in your mind exercise and eating, or at least exercising restraint?

The Knife and Forklift, a combination of dumbbells and utensils, forces you to exercise while “forklifting” food from plate to mouth as you're actually doing curls with a dumbbell .

If anything can slow down speeder eaters, this is the ticket. And publicity is the way inventors can turn creativity into a profitable business.

So when it comes to reminding Americans to eat healthy, here’s maybe the message for President Obama to deliver from his bully pulpit to the dining tables across the land . . .

Just Say Slow!

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IS BIGGER BETTER IN PR? - By Thomas J. Madden

About the Author: Thomas J. Madden

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Tom Madden is the founder and CEO of TransMedia Group, one of the world's leading independent PR firms serving clients worldwide since 1981. He has held top executive positions at ABC and NBC,where he was Vice President, Assistant to the President, then Fred Silverman. For his exploits in broadcasting and PR, he has been profiled in Time Magazine, Forbes and The Wall Street Journal. Speeches he wrote have been reprinted in The New York Times and Vital Speeches of the Day. Among awards he has received are a "Bronze Anvil" from The Public Relations Society of America. He is the author of SPIN MAN and King of the Condo. email: TMadden@transmediagroup.com 561-750-9800 Ext: 211
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YOU INVENTED IT. NOW WHAT?

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