Tinkerer Turns Zany Ideas Into Serious Profits

Fred Reinstein was always the tinkerer, the kind of boy who grew up playing with Lincoln Logs and Erector Sets.

In Kansas City, Mo., in the 1950s, he was one of those kids who took things apart and never put them back together again.

Now, in his early 40s, Reinstein’s boyish imagination is thriving, translating itself into a multitude of gadgets, and at times, crackpot inventions.

Reinstein and a handful of others like him are fad merchants, the daredevil capitalists who have brought to market such short-lived wonders as Vegematics, Cabbage Patch dolls, Silly Putty and the Pet Rock.

Reinstein has his own list of creations, and after working his marketing magic over the last 20 years, the owner of Los Angeles-based Merchandising Concepts Inc. has learned that there are risks.

For Reinstein, the All-American hustler, the medicine man of the 1980s, sometimes the magic works and sometimes it doesn’t.

“I remember the crepe pan. There was a bust I’ll never forget,” Reinstein recalled as he fired the wildly successful Wacky Wallwalker--which he distributes--against a window pane and admired its slimy descent.

“We thought it would be great, and then we found out people in St. Joseph, Mo., never even heard of crepes. I put 500,000 of those pans on the market and had to eat 300,000 of them.

“That was back in 1975. I tell you, I haven’t eaten a crepe since. I lost about $2 million on it.”

Then there was the Garden Trimmer, a small hand-held contraption with a whirling blade.

“I kept getting sued by people who would deliberately slice their fingers on it,” Reinstein complained. “One guy actually turned it on and then cut his hand on purpose. I had witnesses. The whole thing bombed and I lost about $100,000 on it.”

He said the first question he asks himself now is, “Can we be sued with the product?”

Then there are other misjudgments.

Shortly after an earthquake struck Los Angeles in 1980, Reinstein shipped water purifiers to various outlets in Southern California. One store sold 4,000 in just a few days.

So he stepped up production. But after the water lines were repaired, no one wanted the purifiers.

For the fad merchant, life is a search-and-destroy mission. Catering immediately to a potential consumer whim is the name of the game. The hot-seller is the cheap, action-oriented product that can entertain for up to 20 minutes, Reinstein said.

Many times, fad items are tested at playgrounds. If the child remains interested in it for 30 minutes, the product is considered a success.

The secret is getting in and out of the market quickly. Leave them begging for more. That’s how the Cabbage Patch doll made it big. It matters not that the product now gathers dust in someone’s attic.

The important thing, Reinstein cautioned, is to make the killing fast and never stick around for the last dollar.

Reinstein said he has a rule of 90 days to make and ship an item and 90 days to sell it out. After that, inventory costs swallow up the profits, and no fad merchant wants to get caught holding the Superball.

In recent years, Reinstein has also given the world the Air Pot, a Thermos with a pump; the Star Wars Force Beam, a toy sword with a light resembling a laser; the Exer-Trimmer, an exercise device that attaches to a doorknob; and such other enterprises as the Mr. T puzzle, an E. T. poster and the LeDome battery-operated nail dryer.

Reinstein said he makes several million dollars a year on about $100 million in sales. He made millions alone on the popular Jet-X car sprayer in the 1970s, although he had to fight off one suit from a man who claimed it took the paint off his car.

These days, he is promoting the Turbo-Wash car cleaner and is working on a coffee pot that will keep coffee fresh all day.

Reinstein figures McDonald’s, which throws out nearly $2 million in coffee every year, will gobble it up.