A loop of faith

Some great ideas, admittedly, dawn on people in the bathroom.

Bill Romine has designed a nifty little gadget that just might make flossing easy, clean and stylish enough to leave the medicine cabinet.

Called Pocket Floss, Romine’s small dental floss dispenser is a Spokane original. More than 10,000 – in colors orange, red, blue, green and white – have been handed out in Spokane.

Despite this marketing blitz, Romine knows it’s a daunting task to sell a new hygiene item people normally use in the privacy of their bathroom.

Sure, dentists urge people to keep floss in their car, stashed in a desk draw or with the television remote control. But really, do most people pick their plaque in the presence of others?

More than one might think, said Romine.

Floss is a $250 million-a-year industry in the United States and with more and more emphasis placed on oral hygiene, he thinks sales are poised to grow.

The Romines are using Spokane as a test market. As an isolated, small city with a staid demographic, Spokane is known as a place to try out new products ranging from fast-food experiments to pharmaceuticals.

“We’re in the perfect place,” Romine said.

An avid flosser for years, Romine came up with an idea one day.

He set to work designing a flosser that works in a loop. Basically, he didn’t want to cut the floss and wrap it around his fingers. He claims the loop design is easier to use and more effective.

After several failed designs, he settled on a little plastic floss holder that dispenses clean floss on one end and then rolls the used floss into a separate, sealed-off chamber. It eliminates threads of floss that inevitably end up on the floor or in the sink.

His idea is now a serious business venture. Along with his brother Dick, Romine has thousands of dollars invested in design, production and marketing.

Two sons, Travis and Jace, are working in the business, formally called Advanced Floss Systems Inc. Travis Romine has marketing and advertising skills, and Jace Romine is a salesman who helped get Pocket Floss into 19 Walgreens stores in Spokane and the Northwest.

So far, the $3 flossers have been met with acceptance and bewilderment, caution and loyalty.

“People don’t know until they try it,” said Travis Romine, who now carries the title operations manager.

In their tiny assembly room at a nondescript building on East Trent, two workers put together the flossers on folding tables. They’re piled into bins and then packaged for retail.

Bill Romine takes special pride in the fact that everything but the actual floss is made in Spokane.

Romine said it’s a business ethic employed by his father.

“It says ‘Made in USA’ but it might just as well say ‘Made in Spokane,’” Romine said. “I’m not after cheaper, faster. I want it kept right here in town.”

The flosses can be embossed with a business logo, making them a potentially interesting gizmo for dentists to hand out or for trade show vendors.

Within weeks the Romines anticipate a big decision. Right now, Walgreens doesn’t place Pocket Floss on the shelf with better-known floss dispensers, such as those made by Glide or Johnson & Johnson.

“If we can get better placement, then I think these things could go to the next level,” Romine said. Sales figures aren’t yet known. Pocket Floss has been in Walgreens for just a few months and the stores haven’t compiled statistics.

Bringing his idea from the bathroom to the marketplace, Romine said, has been interesting.

“Everyone is a quote ‘Idea person,’” he said. “But then you have to execute. Something like this is a leap of faith.”