He’s Stuck on Thicker Stickers
The entrepreneur is in session. A “Munsters” rerun rolls on TV, reggae wafts from a stereo and Kevin Hooker paces barefoot in his tiny apartment with a “Zoyd” stuck to his ear.
Zoyds. Just try to be original anymore. Hooker invented them, named them, packaged them and sells them. More to the point, he wants to make them the biggest fad since Pet Rocks. Since Gumby or Pee Wee Herman.
He sticks the little blobs on walls, mirrors and his Ford Fiesta. He pushes Zoyds at the beach.
Hooker defines a Zoyd as “the original thicker sticker.” The three-dimensional decals are really foam rubber snippets in assorted sizes, colors and abstract shapes.
But Hooker takes them more personally.
“If I get across that this is a little race of friendly, cuttable creatures, then their value will be much higher,” says the 25-year-old Michigan native, looking the prototype of a California surfer.
“People will say: ‘This is primo Zoyd.’ ”
Creating a fad from mere vapor may sound far-fetched--especially if you’re a former competitive windsurfer with a nomadic life style, with no major backer or big company name. Pondering these odds consumes Hooker as he stacks one peanut butter sandwich on another and sits by his Zoyd-covered coffee table.
One recent Sunday was typical, he explained. He went to a battle of the bands in Ventura.
“I came with a few friends and tons of Zoyds. You basically go around sticking Zoyds on people. . . . I dose the place.”
It’s “guerilla marketing”--as one advertising executive puts it--but this windblown athlete has a plan.
First, he test-marketed Zoyds in Utah ski resorts last winter. Second, he moved to Long Beach, because “people like things exported from California.”
Since then, he’s placed thousands of packs of Zoyds, about $2 each, at a smattering of area shops.
He’s also sought the counsel of Rolling Hills entrepreneur Don Kracke, who had a get-rich-quick scheme of his own 20 years ago. Kracke invented Rickie Tickie Stickie decals, which sold in the millions during 1968.
“Zoyds are just dumb enough to make it,” said Kracke.
“Zoyds make no sense whatsoever. They have no redeeming social characteristics. There’s no need for them. On the other hand, people’s need to put sticky things on other things hasn’t gone away.
“If you get too analytical,” Kracke added, “you’d never start any of these things.”
Kracke tells Hooker and other novice fad makers that their chances of scoring are 100 to 1.
And Hooker, with that I’m-the-one expression, says Zoyds will fill a slew of ‘80s needs, from color to “stress relief,” from “spreading happiness” to “removable fun.”
It’s a consumer niche also addressed by the last fad he rode: colored zinc-oxide. Last year, he was promotions director for Long Beach-based Zinka sunscreen.
“Kevin used to like to go to bars and paint people up (with Zinka),” recalled Zinka’s Mike Rodgers, 27.
During that phase, Hooker was also promoting a no-skid surfboard covering called Astrodeck. He says every time he looked at those colorful rubber strips, he saw a man’s necktie.
“I started sticking stuff to the strips--and said “Woooooo. This could be a serious build-your-own accessory.”
This could be primo Zoyd.
Now Hooker buys most of his raw materials from Astrodeck.
In naming his would-be fad, Hooker thought he would play off Zinka’s success.
“I wanted another Z word,” he says. “Zerbs, Zykes, Zabs, Zooks. I went through about 70 Z names.” His trendy friends rated Zoyds highest. So he registered the name.
“I basically threw some in a bag and started selling them.”
“Now I’m trying to find out what’s the faddiest market. Get people addicted. By Christmas, it could be a heavy-duty stocking stuffer.”
Somehow, he’s finding believers.
Dick Chandler of Rolling Hills heads a medical-products company and owns a percentage of Zoyds Unlimited. Granted, he’s Hooker’s uncle. But he did risk $7,500.
“I wouldn’t do it with money that I wasn’t prepared to lose--let’s put it that way,” said Chandler, adding: “Kevin sees opportunities in places I would never see them.”
The son of a former Playboy photographer, Hooker grew up in Detroit, Chicago and Salt Lake City--concocting a series of inventions along the way.
“He had some kind of battery fluid he was convinced would revolutionize wet-cell batteries,” recalled his father, Dwight Hooker.
A windsurfing enthusiast during his teens, Kevin qualified for the 1984 summer Olympic trials. Eventually, he turned pro, circling the country in a van, supporting himself selling recreational products.
The elder Hooker observes that his son veers toward “joyous products,” attributing his son’s enjoyment ethic to an early loss: Kevin’s mother died at the age of 24.
“No one had expected him to do much more than get by with a happy life,” said Dwight Hooker.
In his whitewashed Long Beach apartment, Kevin Hooker answered the phone with a crisp: “Zoyds!” He talked of one nightclub’s invitation to make a Zoyd mural--and of keeping his priorities. No 9-to-5 grind for him.
“If I can do international business out of my home, I’m more than happy,” Hooker said as an ocean breeze twitched the sheets covering his windows.
“I was gonna go windsurfing this afternoon,” he said. “But I’ve been rapping here too long.”
