Trademarks and Travel: Snuggage Client Feature

Like many of his peers, Dave Laity was feeling unfulfilled in his professional life. He’d reached the point years into his career when you realize you may have missed your calling and begin to worry that it’s too late to find it; but Dave did find it one day with the help of his daughter, who noticed that her dad was looking a little down.

“I told her I just wasn’t happy with what I was doing and she asked me ‘well, what do you really want to do? And I told her I had always liked creating things that make life easier for other people.’” Upon hearing this, Dave’s daughter challenged him to take one hour of one night every week to focus on nothing but inventing.

Dave took to these instructions with gusto, but he soon found that he could not contain his passion into just one night a week. “My brain just wouldn’t shut off; it just kept going,” he remembers. What was keeping his mind so busy? Just a little problem that had been niggling at him for ages but had sat on the back-burner until now.

“I went on a trip once, and when I came back, I could not find my luggage.” Dave had to watch with growing frustration as black suitcase after black suitcase rolled past, with no clue as to which one was his. He could only be completely sure when his suitcase was the last one sitting on the carousel.

The whole experience set a fire inside Dave. “I thought, ‘there has to be a better way.’” Dave imagined a personalized, elasticized suitcase cover that could envelop the luggage and be spotted from across the airport. The idea had almost been forgotten until now.

Dave had the design in his head for his suitcase covers, but how to know if it could work? He would need to make one. Luckily, his sister was a seamstress, and she agreed to give substance to what was going on in her brother’s head. Using a suitcase as a model, Dave’s sister created a prototype made from bathing suit material.

From there, it was a matter of making the suitcase solution universal. As suitcases come in different shapes and sizes, while following airport guidelines, Dave needed to make a one-size-fits-all product. Constructed with elasticized materials and some clever stitching, the cover fit every suitcase like a sock, with no need for zippers or velcro. But what to call it?

“We were really struggling with the name,” Dave admits. “Suitcase Sock” wasn’t quite the thing, but then “Snuggage” was suggested. “It was perfect; you can tell exactly what it does without being obvious.” So Snuggage launched.

One thing Dave was rightly concerned about was intellectual property theft. He met with a patent lawyer who told him what he really needed was a trademark. After doing some research, Dave reached out to three trademark agencies, including Witmart. Only Witmart responded, contacting Dave just half an hour after sending his request.

Witmart worked closely with Dave, explaining the trademark process thoroughly. “I felt really comfortable with them, so I said, let’s go for it! Witmart has worked well for me. I would definitely recommend them to others.” Witmart has worked with Dave on both his U.S. and Canada trademark filings.

David was excited to share with Witmart some of his favourite Snuggage features. For one thing, it’s a great security measure. “A thief can jab a pen and slide it down to open the zipper on your case. Snuggage is a huge deterrent to theft because it would take too long to steal from.” The cover also keeps your case clean and your zippers and tags from snagging on other objects. When it’s off your suitcase, it’s a great way to save your seat.

And of course, the feature that started it all: you can identify your suitcase from clear across the terminal.

Dave has big plans for Snuggage. “I want to be able to sell right across North America and continue growing.” It’s all about the math, he explains. There are 87,00 flights carrying on average 100 people per trip flying over the United States every day. That’s 8.7 million people who could use a Snuggage cover. 

Snuggage is slotted for growth in the design department as well. “We have our own designs, but we want to do custom designs for companies and organizations.” Dave is particularly excited about journey-specific covers as a way for tourists to tell the story of where they’ve been. “Niagara Falls, Route 66, famous landmarks; people can say, I was here.”

Amid all of his plans for expansion, Dave gets a little thrill whenever he sees Snuggage on Amazon. “It’s an amazing feeling. It’s something I invented, and people are buying it.”

Dave takes a philosophical approach to being an entrepreneur. “Even the sky isn’t the limit. You don’t need to be afraid of competition; there’s room for everybody. You don’t need the whole market, just a little piece. Just find yourself some mentors, don’t try to do everything on your own, and keep at it.”

If you would like to learn more about Snuggage, you can connect with them online via the links below:

Website: https://snuggage.com/

Facebook: @snuggage 

Instagram: @snuggage