Wants help marketing technology

Press, 1 March 1984, Page 19

Wants help marketing technology

Garrick Johnson has built what he thinks is a better self-steering system for yachts, but prospective buyers are not yet beating a path to his door.

He needs more of a marketing push with a product that can be hard to sell except after face-to-face meetings with boat owners. That kind of approach takes time and money, and a shortage of both is one reason the Servohelm wind vane gear has not yet become the solid basis of a manufacturing business.

Mr Johnson, a chartered production engineer, is head of the University of Canterbury’s applied mechanics laboratory.

He is an inventor who describes himself as “one of the back room boys.” If he can, he wants to get out in front and boost the chances of his gear. He is certain he will succeed, and just wants to speed the process along. So far, he is not sure how to do it. He wants to do better for himself and provide jobs for others. He first started to design a system, which he used originally on his own boat, some years ago, after reading accounts of self-steering gear failing during voyages. He questioned aspects of the engineering of such devices. He has sold more than 12 work-shop-produced models locally, but is still looking for a sale in other parts of the country and overseas. “It’s difficult to set up in busL ness, especially with the product I’ve got — to do with the leisure industry and to a certain extent a luxury,” he says. “It has a fantastic market on a world basis, if I can reach it.

“My product is a wee bit like life insurance. I’ve got to approach people and show them its virtues and benefits.”

While he is doing that, Mr Johnson cannot be devoting as much time to the workshop side of the product. He is not being a pioneer with the self-steering gear because other systems exist, but he thinks his is one of the best in the world.

“I’m bursting with technology, and I’m having difficulty wearing the right number of hats at the same time,” says Mr Johnson. “It is very difficult to market technology. There is a sort of communications gap that needs to be bridged, but that’s an expensive business.”

Help offered by the Development Finance Corporation did not seem too practical. “The D.F.C. won’t lend money until I come up with some orders, but I can’t get orders until I can market it properly,” he says. "It’s a Catch-22 situation.” He has been advised that one way to break into the Australian market would be to build a batch of the systems, stock them in an Australian clearinghouse and sell them from there, getting around the frustrations of Customs and currency exchange problems for single export models. Then it becomes a question of who could look after the business from that side, and an added cost for having someone.

Mr Johnson wants to try manufacturing the gear ijmself, instead of letting another company do it.

“If you are farming out a product, and getting something back in royalties, the returns can be abysmal,” he says.

He will be in the position of designing, producing, stocking and advertising the product. If he has to borrow money at high interest rates on top of that, “I’ll go bankrupt,” he says. “I believe the politicians believe help is available for this sort of thing, and it’s not.” If someone else cannot champion the product in an affordable way, he will have to do it himself.

“It comes down to salesmanship and a certain persistence, which up to now I haven’t had the time for,” says Mr Johnson, who has 25 years of design experience. “People want to know that the engineering is sound, that it will hold up, and that the gear is thoroughly tested. The idea* is going to get over in time, when people start saying these things are pretty good. It will take some time for your reputation to grow — 60 per cent of the market is held by gear that’s been around some 12 years.”

There is also an electronic autopilot on the market. Mr Johnson says the systems should not be in opposition, so he is developing an electronic retrofit unit for his gear, and designing a method that would allow either system to be used. “It would be a very powerful marketing package,” he says. It would also double as an off-course alarm, and the electronic part would use little power. It could be run off solar panels. Mr Johnson contacted the City Council’s employment promotion office in December for advice on what to do next, and was “pleasantly surprised at the response.” His product has a Designmark and an explanatory pamphlet. His small business counsellor suggested a selling tool relying more on graphic design and less on detailed technical explanations of the product.

Mr Johnson is not yet convinced. “A new pamphlet could give me a better image, but would it sell any more self-steering gear?” he says. “I have got to educate people that these can be useful in week-end sailing, not just on long trips., It’s possible it could become a fashionable thing, like ski racks on your car.”

On future selling trips, such as one being planned to the Bay of Islands later this year, he and his wife will take a demonstration model of Servohelm.

“I have got to get the feel of the product to these people,” he says. He is steadily refining the gear and “getting rid of bottlenecks that might slow production, but I want to freeze the design so I can get on with penetrating the market.” If Servohelm becomes the basis for a business, “I want to be out there finding out what the public wants, considering new developments,” he says. “Who knows, it could be obsolete in 10 years.” Mr Johnson has designed other products, including a compact hydrostatic release for a lifeboat;

“I have got to get a succession of products out, but I’ve got to get one item going to sustain me. What I’ve got in front of me is a very slow word-of-mputh process. “I certainly won’t be employing anybody at that rate.”