A Story of Perseverance.

The Birth of an Idea and the Start of a Journey…

In 1997, while studying at Northumbria University, Rob Law was struck by an idea while walking down the toy aisle of a local department store. His idea- a suitcase that doubled up as a ride on toy for small children. Law was captivated with this novel idea, and quickly began pitching his idea to different companies in the hope that they would buy it from him and manufacture these  suitcases. He was met by harsh rejection from every company he pitched his idea to though- the toy companies said it was a suitcase and the suitcase companies said it was a toy. Disheartened, Law set aside his dream for a time to do some traveling.

A First Attempt…

Law arrived back in the UK in 2002, with a simple plan: scrape together some  money, and find a licensee for his idea which he called the “Trunki”. At first it appeared as if everything was going to work out- he successfully secured a loan from the bank, and found a company at the London toy show that was interested in producing the Trunki. The two of them agreed that the producer would take care of all of the Trunki’s sourcing, production, distribution, and sales, leaving Law free to continue in his current career as a design consultant. This partnership turned out to be a total flop and within three years the chinese manufacturer had only managed to sell 19,000 units. To make matters worse, in 2005, the Chinese producer of the Trunki went bankrupt, leaving Law in a virtual limbo.

Starting from Scratch. Again.

At this point, Law was left with no other options but to start from scratch. He took a £10,000  loan to start his own business to continue producing the Trunki. In the spring of 2006, just before Magmatic, Trunki’s parent company, was about to go public, a key Chinese producer that Law had been relying on went bust, forcing him to scramble to find a new producer on very short notice. Consequently, when the first batch of Trunkis hit the stores, the company faced a barrage of complaints about faulty parts and cheap construction. Finally, in September of 2006, Law appeared on Dragon’s Den, a national business pitch show in the UK, to present his product idea. Law was humiliated as the judges criticized his idea and then pulled the strap off of the toy with virtually no effort.

Turning Lemons Into Lemonade…

Although many would have slumped off in defeat after such a humbling experience, Law used the press he got to his advantage. He fixed the faulty strap and used his new publicity and website traffic to market his product to consumers and retailer’s alike. After only a few short weeks Law began to land deals with several major department stores including Toys’R’Us and his sales took off like a rocket.

Success!

Trunki used its new found success to broaden its reaches and began its plight in the international market. Trunki is now sold in 1,564 stores in 64 countries and its parent company, Magmatic is grossing roughly £6,000,000 a year. It is currently estimated that 1 in 10 three to six year old children in Britain actually owns a Trunki- an impressive feet for someone who had failed so many times to even bring the product to market. Surprisingly, Law has never attempted to file a patent for his Trunki idea, because he feels as though there is very little intellectual property there to steal. In addition, he has found that by not applying for a patent, his company has actually been able to make more money, while still owning the market for the “traveling toy”.

Magmatic currently employs 21 full time staff and focuses on selling its products in the cheapest, most personal way possible. Consequently, they company does no front end advertising, and instead relies on personal demonstrations to journalists for their PR, in addition to some well made youtube videos.

The results are several million pounds worth of advertising that have only cost Magmatic a total of £200,000 in the company’s lifetime. The company’s focus on personal relationships, fun, and possibility have set them aside from their fellow toy companies, and in 2011 Trunki won the “Product Business of the Year” Award at the Fast Growth Business Awards. From the slide in Law’s office, to his name tag “Trunki daddy”, Magmatic truly shows the power that persistence, vision, and fun can have in the world of business.