1/31/99

Gadget girl searches for next big invention

23-year-old spends her days with spinning lollipops and tongue scrapers

By Genna McLaughlin

TRIBUNE-REVIEW

Got a dream?

A why-didn't-anyone-think-of-it-before invention that could revolutionize the way people live? A product so simple but so needed, it would rake in millions?

Better check with Jennifer Yarnell of South Greensburg before remortgaging the house and pillaging the retirement fund.

Chances are, it's already out there.

In fact, it's probably in Yarnell's Pittsburgh Inpex office somewhere - in a box between the shot glasses made of ice and the keg tap you work with your toe - waiting for a manufacturer with the right price.

Yarnell is the company's gadget girl, the assistant show manager for domestic clients, the one who circles the country by phone and by train recruiting products for the company's yearly invention show in May.

Along the way, she has discovered the mailbox strobe light, an ornate grave leveler and a tongue scraper.

"I've seen it all," the 23-year-old says from her large loft office inside a small building in Pittsburgh's Downtown Cultural District. "My favorite was a screen that had Christmas lights on it. All you had to do was pop it in the window."

There's more.

Ear protectors for curling iron users.

Cardboard chairs that can hold hundreds of pounds.

A lollipop that spins.

Most of them are somewhere in Yarnell's office, which is crowded with colorful gadgets.

Some of them are past show items - a utility knife with replaceable cartridges that struck it big with an endorsement from television's Tim "The Tool Man" Allen, a hand-held massager she bought at GNC with an Inpex label on the box.

Others - a stress reliever ball, a water gun, Beanie Babies, a 6-foot tall cardboard duck she uses as a dartboard - are just for fun.

"Do you think I'm still into toys?" Yarnell asks, laughing.

But as fun as it all sounds (and looks), the invention business is serious to those who are looking for a break.

"To these people, their product is their life, their child, their future," she says.

In some cases, that's a million-dollar future. In others, it's a small profit or none at all. They're not all destined for Post-It note glory.

According to Inpex sister company, Invention Submission Corp., one out of every 118 clients licenses products with a manufacturer.

But that doesn't stop them from trying.

Yarnell gets bombarded with ideas, even at local bars when friends pitch their dream inventions.

At the Inpex show, thousands of inventors buy booths hoping that the right person will take interest.

For tree surgeon Bill Killian, Oprah Winfrey was that person.

"The Oprah Winfrey Show" asked Killian and his pop-up gopher that talks and records messages to visit the show after the "Lawn Buddy" won a gold medal at the invention show in 1996, according to Yarnell.

The spin pop is a biggie too.

"It's always one you wouldn't think," she said. "I'd like to say I can pick 'em, but I can't."

Take the Chia Pet, she said.

"Who knew?"