When he was just eleven, Richie Stachowski found his family’s vacation to Hawaii frustrating as he couldn’t speak to his father while they were snorkeling. Such an awful problem to have, right? That evening, after their snorkeling adventure, he began drawing designs and ended up spending his $267 of savings to build a prototype underwater megaphone. Richie’s product, appropriately named the Water Talkie, was built using a small plastic cone, a blow valve and a mouthpiece, allowing swimmers to talk to each other under water.
This completely solved his problem of not being able to talk to his father underwater! The young inventor patented his invention and started Short Stack LLC, a company name inspired by his love for pancakes.
The young entrepreneur took a few days off school to present Toys “R” Us with his idea and was shocked when he received an order for 50,000 units! Other retailers, including K-Mart and Walmart, soon followed, and his Water Talkies were the hit of the summer of 1997, netting Richie’s company around $500,000 in revenue.
Three years after inventing the Water Talkie, Richie sold his company and the rights to produce his inventions to Wild Planet Toys in San Francisco. This company then went on to produce more exciting underwater products like a pool pogo stick, underwater binoculars, and Pool Peepers- swim masks that make a child appear to be an animal or creature of some sort when coming out of the water. All Richie’s inventions are still available in stores as well! Maybe we can all get some Water Talkies and have our Elevator Pitches underwater next year!
Richie Stachowski’s journey as an inventor is an inspiration to all of us, proving that creativity, simplicity and fun are a good foundation for successful product ideas.
This looks so cool! Its funny how such a simple idea can turn into something a lot bigger. Great find!
This is really cute! I applaud his identification of a problem. I think its great that at such a young age he could try and meet a need and was willing to spend all of his savings to do just that. I’m impressed by his knowledge and his courage. Great post!
This is great. It would be an awesome challenge to add to the elevator pitch hosting it all underwater- LOL! I love how it was a simple problem with a simple solution that a young boy can solve. Great post!
This is amazing. The concept, the problem, the solution, the company’s name… Each part of this business is unique. It is fascinating how such a simple idea can turn into such a big success. Great find!
This is inspiring for those of us who are looking to start something small scale in the beginning like the water talkie. You just never know because it could blow up and be worth $500,000 someday.
This is a great example of how we talked about “stumbling on an idea” in class. He felt the need of wanting to talk under water, and met it through this product.