New Dimensions
Fitness equipment inventor
By Don Debelak
Dean Tornabene is the co-inventor with Charles Perez of some of
the best-selling gadgets ever pushed by infomercials, including the
AB Rocker and the Bun and Thigh Sculptor. His inventions over the
past four years have generated more than $300 million in retail
sales and direct-response TV combined.
Tornabene, a former Mr. America who has established himself as a
health and fitness guru, has quite an impressive background, but
his inventing skills go far beyond simply cashing in on his good
looks and name recognition. Tornabene also knows how to create a
distinctive product-one with the potential to find space on retail
shelves and become a smash hit, not just another deadbeat
collecting dust in a corner of Wal-Mart.
Tornabene's first inventions came about when he was a
teenager growing up in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania. His family
couldn't afford expensive fitness equipment, so Tornabene
created his own products. At 22, Tornabene moved to Los Angeles and
gradually realized that the general public needed more than just
exercise to keep in top shape. Hence, Herbal Technologies Inc. was
born, a company that sells two of the most popular herbal
supplements, Fat Fighting System and Metasystem.
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Over the past four years, Tornabene has again turned to fitness
equipment, co-inventing the AB Rocker and the Bun and Thigh
Sculptor. All have been featured on direct-response TV, and now
he's taking yet another stride forward: In 1999, Tornabene
signed an exclusive marketing and sales contract with National
Boston Medical Inc., parent company of Infotopia, to produce a
minimum of 12 new infomercial products over the next four years.
The newest product to be featured is the Body Rocker.
Daniel Hoyng, president, chairman and CEO of Infotopia, notes
the significance of the deal: "Retail sales are even more
important than direct-response sales. To keep a product on
retailers' shelves, it's important to have a branding
strategy that consumers can recognize."
Don Debelak (dondebelak@uswest.net) is a
new-business marketing consultant who has been introducing new
products for more than 20 years. He is the author of Bringing
Your Product to Market (John Wiley & Sons, $19.95,
800-225-5945).
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