Light My Fire

More big news! When we were in Friedrichshafen, Germany, for the European Outdoor trade show, we met the team at Light My Fire Sweden. They have a great line of firestarter equipment (which meshes nicely, themewise, with candle lanterns). They've also started producing a mealkit and a spork. Until now, they have had only minor distribution in the US but we think their products will do very well here. Although they've been approached by a number of US companies, we've been working with them since we met to strike a deal to be the exclusive US distributor of their products. Today we came to an agreement! We have placed our first order and it will be on its way to us next week. By ship the products will take 3-4 weeks to reach us. A few samples will get here much sooner by air.

The Light My Fire products are a great addition to our catalog. I anticipate a long and healthy relationship between our two companies!

Million dollar day

Tomorrow is a big day. We're shipping a large order that will put total sales since the business purchase over $1,000,000! We made it in less than 5 months! Compare this with the projections we made to support the purchase. We estimated 8-10 months to reach $1M. We're having a celebration in the factory on Wednesday.

New web sites!

Today's big news: our two new web sites have gone live! Please take a few minutes to check them out. Feedback is not just welcomed, it's encouraged! Most of us are cross-eyed from looking at these sites so some fresh eyes and different opinions are welcome.

Candle Lanterns at candlelantern.com.

Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker at icecreamrevolution.com.

The Industrial Revolution corporate site will be last in line, due up in a few weeks.

TV coverage

I've shown you a lot of the press coverage we've received on the ball. We also get a report (every week, I think) showing TV coverage. Occasionally it's interesting reading. I thought you'd enjoy a chance to see a sample...

Bacon's Listing Report
Date Range: 2005/08/05 To 2005/08/10

1. WAVE-NBC LOUISVILLE, KY
AUG 5 2005 5:00PM CT
WAVE 5pm News

[**05:14:25 PM**] WE HAVE ALL THE INFORMATION ON WAVE 3 DOT COM. IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO CHECK YOUR CREDIT INFORMATION. EN CONSUMER REPORTS TESTED THE U-C-O PLAY AND FREEZE ICE CREAM MAKER. IT'S A ROUND SHAPED METAL CYLINDER. SO YOUR ICE CREAM IS SHAPED LIKE A BALL.

2. WOWT-NBC OMAHA, NE
AUG 5 2005 5:00PM CT
Evening News

[**05:24:14 PM**] BUT EATING ICE CREAM IS A FAR CRY FROM MAKING YOUR OWN. CONSUMER REPORTS JUST TESTED A NEW ICE-CREAM MAKER THAT PROMISES TO GET THE JOB DONE, WITH SOME FUN, IN ABOUT 20 MINUTES. THE U-C-O PLAY AND FREEZE ICE CREAM MAKER IS A PLASTIC BALL THAT CONTAINS A METAL CYLINDER. FIRST, YOU FILL THE BALL WITH ICE AND ROCK SALT. NEXT, YOU MIX THE ICE-CREAM INGREDIENTS TOGETHER. ... YOU HAVE TO ROLL AND SHAKE THE BALL FOR ABOUT 20 MINUTES TO MAKE THE ICE CREAM. TESTERS FOUND THE YOUNGEST ICE- CREAM ENTHUSIASTS MAY NOT BE ABLE TO GET THE JOB DONE. BUT CONSUMER REPORTS SAYS OLDER KIDS, LIKE AIDAN, BELLA, DANIEL, AND JASON, HAD NO PROBLEM. ... THE PLAY AND FREEZE DELIVERS WITH A PINT OF VERY GOOD, HOMEMADE ICE CREAM. "IT'S GOOD! "SO THE NEXT TIME YOUR KIDS SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM, THEY CAN HAVE A BALL MAKING THEIR OWN! WITH YOUR CONSUMER NEWS, I'M REBECCA KLEEMAN THE U-C-O PLAY AND FREEZE COSTS ABOUT 30 DOLLARS. CONSUMER REPORTS SAYS YOU CAN GET IT FROM L.L. BEAN, OR ONLINE AT U-C-O-CORP-DOT-COM. THE BASIC INGREDIENTS COST ABOUT THREE DOLLARS FOR A PINT OF ICE CREAM.

3. KDVR-FOX DENVER, CO
AUG 8 2005 9:00PM CT
NEWS@NINE

[**09:45:02 PM**] BUT IS THE PRODUCT A FAME OR A SHAME. WELL, THAT'S WHERE FOX 31'S KRISTAL GRIFFITH COMES IN. REPORTER: IT'S A FREEZE FROZEN TREAT THAT GREAT FOR A HOT SUMMER DAY. BUT CAN YOU REALLY MAKE TERRIFIC HOMEMADE ICE CREAM IN THIS BALL? WE ROUNDUP SOME YOUNGSTERS TO HELP PUT THE PLAY AND FREEZE ICE CREAM MAKER TO THE FAME OR SHAME TEST. THE 35-DOLLAR PRODUCT CLAIMS WITH SOME INGREDIENTS AND A WHOLE LOT OF SHAKING, WE'LL HAVE SOME HOMEMADE ICE CREAM IN ABOUT 20 MINUTES. SO WE STARTED MIX MIXING IT UP. ... THE DIRECTIONS SAY TO SHAKE FOR 10 MINUTES, THE PEAK IN. TIMER SET, WE START SHAKING. SHAKE IT UP BABY. COME ON, TWIST AND SHOUT. REPORTER: EVEN OUR FURY FRIEND IS HOPEFUL OF THE OUTCOME. ... THE MAKERS OF THE PLAY AND FREEZE SAY ON AVERAGE IT TAKES 20 MINUTES TO MAKE ICE CREAM. BUT YOU DIDN'T KNOW THAT. BUT YOU NEED TO KEEP DRAINING THE WATER AND ADDING MORE ICE AND ROCK SALT TO KEEP IT COLD IF THAT DID YOU WANT WORK. ... YOU PUT THE ROCK SALT IN THE ICE TO MELT THE ICE AND SALT WATER CAN BE BELOW FREEZE SEWING IT MAKES IT MORE CONSISTENT AND COLD ALL OVER. I'LL BUY THAT FOR A DOLLAR. I'M MORE OF AN EXPERT ON EATING IT RATHER THAN MAKING IT.

4. KABC-ABC LOS ANGELES, CA
AUG 9 2005 4:00PM PT
Eyewitness News

[**04:57:52 PM**] ICE CREAM: ICE CREAM IS THE PERFECT COOL TREAT ON A HOT DAY. WE TEAMED UP WITH CONSUMER REPORTS TO TEST OUT AN ICE CREAM MAKER THAT IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE FUN TO USE. IT'S THE UCO PLAY AND FREEZE ICE CREAM MAKER. IT MADE A PINT OF VERY GOOD HOMEMADE ICE CREAM. IT COST ONLY $30. A PINT OF ICE CREAM COSTS $3 MORE.

Export Mentor Program

We've been accepted into the King County Export Mentor Program. We've been assigned a mentor (we're the protege). He looks like a homerun to me! Here's a bit from his resume (I wish I knew how to do accents). I'll leave out his name to give him a bit of anonymity. Over the next year, he'll be helping us plan and execute an exporting strategy.

Director World Trade Center Tacoma, Tacoma, WA
The World Trade Center in Tacoma is a trade promotional organization that provides resources and programming on international trade issues throughout the Puget Sound region. The director has 21 years of experience in international trade and transportation, holds an MBA from the University of Washington, and is a Certified Global Business Professional. As a former vice president of sales and marketing for a horticultural distributor in Norway, he has extensive experience with importing and exporting. He is able to provide mentoring assistance with strategic planning, marketing, sales, payments, and transportation/distribution issues.

Evil competition

Our Amazon store is a great success story for us. However, others are starting to sell the ball on Amazon as well. One company in particular seems to be fairly awful. While we're working hard to keep our negative feedback as low as possible (it's currently about 4%), this company just doesn't seem to care. Their negative feedback is currently 24%. They are selling a number of other UCO products as well and most of them seem suspicious. The prices are too low, the descriptions are strange (incomplete, etc.). I'm debating sending a note to Amazon, but this company may self-destruct anyway with their weird pricing and terrible service.

back from NYC

We've returned from the New York International Gift Fair. It wasn't much of a hit from a sales perspective, but I met a lot of people and learned a good bit about the industry, so I still think it was a worthwhile trip. I say this even though I seem to have hurt my back rather seriously. At least I made it home!


Here's the sales summary (1 sale = 1 8-pack of balls):

1. Saturday - 2 sales (no ice cream)
2. Sunday - 1 sale (no ice cream)
   
3. Monday - 5 sales (made ice cream! fed customers and sales reps)
   
4. Tuesday - 5 sales (no ice cream, no Keith)
   
5. Wednesday - 2 sales (maybe more after I left)
   

My theory is that making ice cream on Monday had a big impact. Even though we weren't there on Tuesday, the sales agents were able to plug the ball more sincerely since they'd seen it work the day before.

What else did I learn?

• The reps have a big influence on what their customers buy. If the rep is interested and thinks its a good fit for the customer, that goes a long way.
  
• A reasonable commission is in the 10-15% range. Our commissions are in the right range.
• Lots of places want free freight. Freight cross-country can be as much as $2 per ball for our bulky product, so I understand the problem. However, I decided to turn them down and told them that we were spending our money on a PR campaign instead. Not a popular decision all around but I liked it!
• We need to pay a bit more and get space on the aisle. This was a particular problem because it was so bloody hot in our area. The air conditioning in the Javits center did not reach all areas equally. Strangely, it was about 10 degrees cooler in the aisle than in the booth by our product, even though the two areas were only 8-10 feet apart.
  
• Making ice cream matters, but tiny little spoons allow one batch to go a loooooooong way!
  

My inner toy collector also had a field day. I cruised about 25% of the rest of the show and had a great time checking out all the new toys and gifts. It was like the world's greatest toy store except that you can only buy stuff in packs of 24.

The sales guys from ThinkFun had the space adjacent to us. They are the premier manufacturer of mass-market brainteasers, so I really enjoyed chatting with them and checking out their products. In particular, they have a new item called Gordian's Knot. It's not yet available but I had a great time playing with the prototype. I impressed the main sales guy when I got it apart without using the solution guide. Putting it together again was way beyond my skills but I managed it with the solution guide.

Oh, and my back... Tuesday, after my morning shower, I suddenly had severe mid-back pain (right side). I flopped into the bed (easily accessible from every corner of our hotel room) and ended up spending the day there. I think I must have over-compensated somehow for the pain on the right side because by the next day the extreme pain had moved to the lower left. I've dealt with this before and it has taken anywhere from days to months to go away. The fact that the pain moved (and didn't appear while lifting a sofa) gives me hope that I'll heal up in a few days. In the meantime, I stand crooked.

visiting Kirkhams

I'm typing this at 2:00am in NYC. Off to bed soon.

I thought I'd relate the fun we had visiting Kirkhams in SLC yesterday. We left the Outdoor Retailer show about an hour early and set out to find and visit this retailer in the SLC area. They're not only a customer for our candle lanterns (although they don't buy directly from us, rather through a distributor), but they're also one of the customers for our metal-working talents. We have made thousands of T-shaped fittings for them over the years, including many in the last few months since I've taken over. I knew the fittings were used in a tent sold by Kirkhams, but I wanted to see it for myself.

The tent line is called Springbar. There are about 14 varieties, almost all of which have a major structural element consisting of an aluminum tube passing over the top of the tent. The joints at the ends of the bar each use one of our fittings. We only make 2 sizes, but they use them for 14 different tents. Pretty clever!

You can see the fitting in the top center part of the picture below. The aluminum tube has been crimped in place on the fitting.
















It was also fun to visit their candle lantern area. We bought several items on the "product development" budget for later examination. They were selling knockoff candles made for our lanterns. Although slightly cheaper, they seemed to be more uniform in look and feel than the ones we sell. There's definitely some room for quality improvement in our candle line.

We also bought a Cocoon XL, a neoprene protective cover for the Candlelier. This was a real treasure to us because we haven't sold them in a few years and we don't have many examples. We'd like to reintroduce some sort of protective bag for the big lantern so it was a delight to find this.



Finally, I will recommend against Ono's Hawaiian Food in SLC. Although the food was indeed ono (it tasted good), it wasn't particularly Hawaiian. I was hoping for laulaus, lomi salmon, kalua pig, etc. Good barbeque, but none of the other delights.

update from Salt Lake City

What a great day. We had a bunch of great experiences. As usual, it will be a couple of months before we can tell if any of this will bear fruit. However, here are a couple of notes...

• We talked to a Chinese bag manufacturer. We want to get a bag custom designed for the ice cream ball. When we first approached the booth both of the reps in the booth came up to talk to us. Both were Chinese and both seemed to be having a terribly difficult time with English. This is not to criticize . . . their English is orders of magnitude better than my Chinese. The interesting part was that one of the reps seemed to be learning English as we talked. By the end of the conversation, she was understanding us just fine and speaking very clearly. We're not sure why she started out "playing dumb" but it was so convincing we almost left rather than try to work through the language barrier. It was a curious opening gambit.
• We met for a while with the founder of peak62.com. Peak62 was just launched in November 2004. The site is expanding fast and seems to be doing very well. Marty, the founder, has a wealth of knowledge about the industry and retailing in particular. He was so attached to a couple of his previous employers, that he kept saying "we" when he referred to them. It was fun and fascinating to get such a data download from someone with far more experience than me.
• Never buy anything from saylors1978. They're sellers on Amazon and, seemingly, many other sites. They listed two balls for sale on the Amazon page where our products are shown but they had a vaguely unpleasant comment attached, "kids tired quickly of this...want to sell it." Steve immediately purchased both balls. Strangely, two days later they refunded his money and claimed to have "listed the wrong product". Less strangely, they've got terrible feedback ratings (1.6 stars out of 5) and other comments from other buyers reflecting the same weird behavior.
• One of our big distributors showed us sales data on our products. The ice cream ball is a hugely successful product for everyone, including this customer. Other than that, sales were basically flat. They asked that we reduce our lot size so that they can hold less inventory. Our rating was 130 and they want us to get up over 200.
  
• One customer suggested that we should "reinvent" the candle lanterns. I think there's some truth to that. At the moment, we aren't spending any money (and not much time) on marketing those products. They need more attention.

And more fun stuff happened, but I'm just too tired to write any more. Night.

SLC

Arrived safely in Salt Lake City last night. Good dinner (too salty) and lots of shop talk. We leave shortly for the show. The waitress last night had an Outdoor Retailer badge. She mentioned that there are 20,000 people in town for the show. More than I would have guessed!

Espaces magazine

We had a review in Japanese, now one in French...

Translation: After a long day of hiking, full with sunshine, does a mad desire for ice cream grip your taste buds? Because there isn’t an ice cream man in the middle of the forest, UCO decided to “join the fun with the functional”. Take some ice cream and some ice (carefully preserved in a thermos or bought at the camp store!), add sugar, salt and— according to taste— fruit, chocolate or vanilla. Mix everything in the ice-cream maker. Next, shuffle the ball for ten minutes or so, playing around with it, until you get a sultry desert…all without electricity. The old adage never tasted so good!

Salt Lake and New York

More travel this week...
Tomorrow I leave for Salt Lake City to attend the Outdoor Retailer Summer Market show. I'll fly straight from SLC to NYC to attend the New York International Gift Fair. I'll be away from home for about 8 days. I'm ready for a vacation already!

Japanese press

Here's another fun feedback form we received today...

Hello

My name is Akemi ..., I just spoke with you on the phone.

I am working for Japanese TV station (based in NY). called NTV.
My production also has Japanese website which is www.namikiteru.com Which website is sponsored by NTT Docomo (the biggest phone company in Japan). We always introduce "What's new" or "What' cool" from NY to Japanese viewer.

So, I would like to introduce your product, Ice cream maker.
I think many Japanese viewer would love to your product !!

We would like to show it for our Japanese viewer, so could you please send us your products?
our address is
...

If you have any question, please feel free to contact me. And please let me know if you have more information about your company and more product news.
I am looking forward to hear from you soon.

Best regard,
...

Amazing day!

Today, starting at 6:30am, we unloaded the latest container of about 6000 balls. By the end of the day at 3:00pm, less than 10% remained on our premises. Most of those will be gone in the next day or two. The next container will be here in about two weeks so we'll be running on fumes (again) until it arrives. Fun!

Salve for the wound

Well, after that unpleasant feedback we received I needed a picker-upper. It arrived today.

Greetings.... I recently purchased my fourth candle lantern.... not as a replacement, but because I like them so much, I just wanted four. They are perfect for back country canoe camping when packing light is essential.... allows us to forgoe taking fueled lanterns and fuel. Truly an amazing product. And today, I was looking at your website, to find out where I could get a replacement spring... and was further amazed to find out that you would send one free of charge... how's that for customer focused !! But after contacting my local supplier / store (Mountain Equipment Co-op), I found out they had a supply of replacement parts, and they were able to provide me with a spring, free of charge. Wonderful... absolutely wonderful. If only every consumer product was so well designed and supported by the manufacturer and seller.

Very angry customer

Almost everyone seems delighted with their ice cream maker (or candle lantern). However, there are exceptions. I'm not quite sure how this customer managed to spend so much money buying ice cream balls ($45 each?), but she sure is mad.

In the information that is included with the ice cream maker is very deceptive. I was extremely excited to find more recipes and pictures and other things that the brochure claimed. I was very disappointed to find hardly any new or different information and just a few new recipes. "Don't settle for 31 flavors..." Well, it looks like I may have settle for even less. And to think that I bought a total of four of these things. One for myself and the others for gifts. Luckily I've only given out one so far so I don't have to be completely mortified. I am extremely disappointed with my purchases. I feel like I flushed nearly $180 down the toilet. Thanks for nothing and not only will I NOT recommend your ice cream maker to everyone I know, I will be absolutely sure to specifically tell each one of them to NEVER EVER buy any single one of your products no matter how cool it may look or sound.

Police visit

The container showed up as expected this morning. Everything went very smoothly, even when the police showed up. You see, I had opened the container with bolt cutters because the tamper-proof bolt installed in China can only be removed that way. A neighbor thought it looked suspicious that I was opening the container with bolt cutters (instead of a key, I suppose) and called the cops. I got to educate the policeman about international business!

I also asked the cops to thank the person who reported me. I'm glad to know that the neighbors are looking out for us!

Nigeria

Who knew there were so many business opportunities in Nigeria?

Dear Sales,
My name is Mary Thom.I saw your products from one of my client in USA,And i Desired to contact you via email.I will like to place an order from your store to one of my client new branches he just open in NIGERIA where the goods will be sold and they sell various things which your products fall to the category,so i am in charge of ordering all the products needed,but right now i am not in the state which it may be easy.Before i proceed with the selection of items needed i wantnto comfirm some things before we start this transaction,do you normally ship worldwide to NIGERIA via DHL EXPRESS,UPS EXPRESS,USPS EXPRESS AIR FREIGHT AND EMS GLOBAL EXPRESS as they are the fastest way to ship products and the Two Method Of payment will have was Credit card (Visa ,Master,Discover and Amex) So I want you to get back to me with your Company Information such as the name of your websites and your phone number as for me to make selection of items needed.Your Quick Respond will be highly Appreciate !!
Best Regards.

Our state department begs to differ. Here are a couple of quotes from the May 20, 2005 Travel Warning:

Road travel is dangerous. Robberies by armed gangs have been reported on rural roads and within major cities. Travelers should avoid driving at night. Because of poor vehicle maintenance and driving conditions, public transportation throughout Nigeria can be dangerous and should be avoided. Taxis pose risks because of the possibility of fraudulent or criminal operators, old and unsafe vehicles, and poorly maintained roads.

Most Nigerian airlines have aging fleets, and maintenance and operational procedures may be inadequate to ensure passenger safety.

Some Nigerian-based criminals conduct advance fee fraud and other scams that target foreigners worldwide. These fraudulent activities pose great risk of financial loss. Recipients traveling to Nigeria to pursue such fraudulent offers have been subject to physical harm, and local police authorities are often unwilling to help in such cases. No one should provide personal financial or account information to unknown parties. Under no circumstances should U.S. citizens travel to Nigeria without a valid visa -- an invitation to enter Nigeria without a visa is normally indicative of illegal activity. Furthermore, the ability of U.S. Embassy officers to extricate U.S. citizens from unlawful business deals and their consequences is limited. Persons contemplating business deals in Nigeria are strongly urged to check with the U.S. Department of Commerce or the U.S. Department of State before providing any information or making any financial commitments.

Hmmm. I think I'll pass on this otherwise tempting opportunity.

It worked!

The container is on its way here!

Angry man with a lawnmower

Somewhere in the Puget Sound, at this very moment, there is an angry man. This man is angry because he cannot mow his lawn right now even though that's exactly what he wants to do. You may be wondering why this bit of trivia is appearing in my blog. How is this angry man linked to Industrial Revolution? Good question.

Our most recent container of ice cream balls arrived earlier this week from China. It was unloaded into the "yard" yesterday. Because things are so busy down there, they didn't want to wait until Monday to deliver our container (and others, I suppose). Our trucker, from Company A, went down to the yard to retrieve the container. Unfortunately, the container had already been assigned to Company B so our trucker was turned away. He called his boss (the lawnmower man) to report this development. His boss told him to get back in line and, at the gate, claim to be from Company B. The boss is waiting for his cell phone to ring with a call from the trucker. Then the boss will call my factory manager who will call me (I'm at the factory). Then we'll arrange for the dropoff. The key thing here is: the boss can't hear his cell phone if he's mowing the lawn, so the grass grows longer while the trucker waits. We all hope the ruse will work.

new kanban carts

I took some pictures today of our new kanban carts. The thing to notice, aside from the smaller amount of inventory they carry (a very good thing) is that they only take up half as much floor space as the white ones. Since we had 54 of the white ones, they were occupying a significant portion of our factory (about 675 sqft of the 10,000 sqft factory, and usually right in the middle of the aisle). When we're done we'll have about 30 of the new carts which will take up about 188 sqft of floor space.


Another side benefit of the new carts is that the parts are now stored in a useful way. The shop folks used to use buckets to scoop parts from the white bins into smaller bins (often yellow ones!) that they could handle. Check out how one mechanic is able to use the new bins just as they are without any additional handling of the parts.

Beloved candle lantern

I really enjoy these notes from people that love our products:

i have owned one of your fabulous lanterns for many years, and it is one of my favorite possessions. sadly, i somehow managed to lose the internal spring that pushes the candle up as it burns... and my beloved lantern has been rendered useless. i own the original one-candle model, and if you could send me a new spring, i would greatly appreciate it.

Sales leads

There seems to be a bit of art to determining whether feedback from our website's feedback form is legit or not. Lately we've been getting a number of sales leads which appear very dubious. Note that they never mention our company by name or any of our specific products. This seems to be some sort of generic fishing expedition. And, since they mention Nigeria, they have the unfortunate link to the Nigerian email scams. There are two we've received today...

hello,
Am lussy hase by name,am the purchase officer at alex stores in alexandria.i have heard about your site and the comfort of your services from one of your customers who is my superior here.i would like to place an order to our branches in greece,norway ,nigeria.i tried getting them on amazon but they were too costly.mode of payment is by our american issued credit card.pls can you handle the shipping ? i will be looking towards to your respond.

Thanks
lussy

and...

Hello Sales,
Greetings from MIKE Trading Company.This is DON the Purchasing Manager this particular company,we are interested in your products and we will like you to response with this question below.
1) Do you ship Internationally to Lagos state,Nigeria?
2) Do you ship via this shipping comapny below(DHL EXPRESS,FEDEX
WORLDWIDE,UPS) ?
3) Do you have a website for us to email you the items we are interested in ordering.?
4) Our mode of payment will be Credit card .
5) Do you sale in Wholesale or Retail ?
We want you to email us the question here so that we can proceed.Your response will be highly appreciated.
Thanks
MIKE DON
Purchasing Manager

New customers

As we are struggling to provide ice cream to our existing customers, we're still picking up new customers. We're expecting an order for several hundred balls tonight from a new customer. Another one contacted us and asked us to start the process to become a supplier to them. It will take about a month and then they'll start with an order for hundreds of balls. Fun!

MIT class help

This summer the new LFM class (graduating in 2007, I believe) is taking a course call "Lean and Six Sigma." These two topics are personal favorites of mine so when the professor sent an email to graduates asking for volunteers to help I sent him my name. Volunteering means participating in about 3-4 hour-long phone conversations concerning a process improvement activity. Three students were assigned to me. They sent me a great email showing the questions they needed to address in our first phone conversation. When we talked today they added that on a personal level they were also quite curious about my quest to buy a business. We had a fun talk about the kanban implementation I've discussed previously in this blog. They're also going to talk to some of the other folks at the factory to see how they're dealing with the changes. I enjoyed our talk.

I should mention that we got off to a nice start when one of the students mentioned that he already owns one of our candle lanterns!

Two more newspaper articles

Click on these to see larger pictures...