Safety device in troubled waters

In 1998 Bob Lyons invented the Safety Turtle, a personal immersion alarm, to help save children's lives. The Turtle is worn on a child's wrist and will sound an alarm at a base station if the child falls or walks into water.
Confident his invention would prevent drownings - the second-leading cause of unintentional death among children between the ages of one and four, according to the Red Cross - Mr. Lyons believed Canadian safety organizations would endorse the device. He was mistaken.
Problems started soon after launch. When Mr. Lyons asked the Canada Safety Council and the Lifesaving Society to test the product, they declined. "We didn't expect them just to jump on our bandwagon, but we expected them to do some investigation, some research. And if they did that, we had great confidence they would come to some positive conclusion."
But the Canada Safety Council doesn't test commercial products. "We're not aligned with manufacturing or business and industry. Once we get into those kind of endeavors, we compromise the integrity of our message. To be honest, we're not set up to do those kinds of things [testing] either," says Jack Smith, president of Canadian Safety Council.
The Lifesaving Society also declined testing the Safety Turtle for liability reasons. "There's always a chance the batteries aren't working or someone doesn't put it on securely," explains Barbara Byers, public education director for the Lifesaving Society.
Mr. Lyons had to the United States to find a safety association willing to test his product. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission tested the Safety Turtle and found the product to be safe and reliable.
But that was only the beginning of Mr. Lyons' frustration. He was soon to discover that regardless of the merit of his product, the category it belonged to (pool alarms) wasn't perceived by the associations as fitting in with the message of water safety they believe is most important: Parents should always supervise children when they are in and around water, and should never be more than an arm's length away.
"We think guardian supervision is imperative. After the kids are in the pool when they shouldn't be, we think the Safety Turtle is not a bad product, but it's more mitigation than prevention," Mr. Smith says.
As a result, when asked to comment on Safety Turtle, neither the Lifesaving Society nor the Canada Safety Council were or are prepared to endorse it.
No one would argue with the critical importance of parental supervision, least of all Mr. Lyons. But he believes the tepid response scared off potential purchasers. "People listen to these statements and then don't buy the product," he says.
Indeed, Safety Turtle sales representatives got dealers and distributors to carry the product in 1999, but it didn't move off the shelves.
Mr. Lyons then attempted to establish common ground by meeting with the decision makers at the associations. He had some luck with Rick Haga, former national executive director of the Lifesaving Society from 1992 to 2007, who finally said, while it doesn't take the place of supervision, Safety Turtle is an added level of defence.
"An increased awareness and understanding of the product and the research Bob and his team put behind it helped. In addition, as time went by, it [Safety Turtle] started to stand the test of time," Mr. Haga says.

However, Mr. Lyons couldn't bridge the gap with all groups. When he met with Emile Therien of the Canada Safety Council back in 1999, he wasn't able to ease concern that parents would rely on Safety Turtle instead of supervision. Ms. Byers shares the same concern, today.
"I think Bob is very safety conscious but the position of the Lifesaving Society is if we endorse any one product like the Safety Turtle that gives parents a false sense of security."
(Mr. Lyons' position is that research shows supervision can and will fail. Furthermore, he adds, "People don't buy Safety Turtle so they can go and bake a cake.")
Nevertheless, support remained limited at best. As a result, it became a struggle for Mr. Lyons' company to survive. Some sales kept the business afloat but Mr. Lyons, his partners, reps and family all felt tremendous pressure.
"There were people that wanted to wind it up. I would have wound it up, too if it hadn't been for a few lifesaving stories and some feedback."
But he hung in, did a major refinancing in 2001 to "put the balance sheet in barely respectable form," and started to turn his attention to the U.S. market. Having the support of the Consumer Products Safety Commission - their spokesperson demonstrated Safety Turtle on CNN, for example - made it easier to make inroads there. Today, 68% of Safety Turtle sales come from the United States and more than 20% is generated outside North America. And Mr. Lyons is happy to report the business is viable.But entrepreneurs be warned: If there is a philosophical difference between an association's position (and message) and a product, support may not be forthcoming and that could affect the health and direction of the business