Firefighter Brent Berkompas stood on the frontlines of the California wildfires in 2003 and thought about how homes could be better protected from fast-moving flames.
When he realized that there were few fire repellent vents on the market, he decided to come out with his own.
Berkompas started San Clemente-based Brand-guard Vents Inc. in 2003. The company makes steel vents for homes and light commercial buildings that protect them from flying fire embers, which are known to be a leading cause of damage in wildfires.
Brandguard’s target for 2009 is $3 million in sales.
Brandguard licenses its product to Baldwin Park-based Award Metals, which makes its vents and distributes them to about eight roofing wholesale supply companies in California.
Berkompas, a firefighter for the city of San Bernardino, runs Brandguard with his wife Kelly, a former marketing executive for Procter & Gamble Co.
It took Berkompas nearly four years to research and design Brandguard’s vents with the help of the University of California, Berkeley’s Forest Products Laboratory.
Thousands of dollars and about 20 prototypes later, the company developed its vents and learned the joys and frustrations of filing for a patent and trademark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Berkompas and his wife decided that it would be more cost effective to license the product to others than to make it themselves, he said.
The biggest challenge facing the company now is getting the word out, Berkompas said.
Brandguard is trying to market its products to architects and contractors who work with homebuilders and developers. But it is challenging to break into a slow building environment as an infant company, he said.
“It’s hard getting the word out because we’re new,” he said.
Rivals such as Rohnert Park-based O’Hagin’s Inc. make a good chunk of the air ventilation systems used by homebuilders and architects.
Berkompas said he believes that his company will be able to carve its niche with its design, he said.
“We’re entering an untouched market with our technology,” Berkompas said.
Berkompas said he’s counting on the new California Fire Building Standards and Fire Hazard Severity Zone Mapping rules to boost business, he said.
The rules require all exterior vents on homes to be designed to resist fire ember intrusion, which is what Brandgaurd’s vents do, he said.
“The new regulations should help us generate business, but only time will tell,” Berkompas said.
Next year, the company plans to license its technology to more manufacturers. The company also plans to hire sales representatives, he said.
Trendy Travel Tools
When Shannon Green isn’t developing shopping centers, she’s busy designing what she calls the next “it bag.”
Green owns RichLee Bags, a Newport Beach-based company that expects to generate $500,000 to $1 million in sales next year making trendy travel cases and cosmetic bags.
RichLee makes and packages its bags in China and stores them at the company’s 1,000-square-foot headquarters in Orange County.
The bags are about 12 inches high, 9 inches wide and 9 inches long. They’re made out of pleather and washable nylon and come in chocolate brown and pink, chocolate brown and baby blue, and black.
RichLee sells its bags for about $80 through its Web site, boutiques and salons such as Primp in Corona del Mar.
Green started RichLee Bags last year and was making travel cases before then.
Green owns Rich Lee Group, a Newport Beach-based company that develops shopping centers in California, Arizona, Texas and Colorado. Green started making travel cases when she couldn’t find any that could accommodate her heavy packing.
Green, a self proclaimed “girly girl” liked to pack everything when she would jet from one business trip to the next.
She looked everywhere for a travel case that was big enough to fit all of her toiletries but light enough to carry around.
Green decided to sew her own. When her friends and colleagues started asking her where they could get a bag like hers, she decided to turn her bags into a business.
Green thought she knew everything about starting a business. After all, she had done it once before when she started her development company in the early 1990s. She came to find that making bags was very different from developing shopping centers.
It took Green several months to create her ideal bag, she said.
“The biggest challenge was communicating the idea on paper. I had the bag in my mind and I wanted to make it exactly the way I envisioned it,” Green said.
Fifty prototypes later, Green created a bag that she thought consumers would buy.
“It took a while but we got there,” she said.
So far the bags have generated a following.
The cast of ABC Network’s “Desperate Housewives” has them. Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler recently bought one for his girlfriend, Green said.
Green’s biggest goal for the upcoming year is to work with distributors to get her bags in department stores such as Bloomingdales. She’s counting on her contacts in the retail center business to help get her bags into other stores, she said.
Next year, Green plans to set up a charity foundation for families of suicide victims in memory of her brother Richard Lee Green. A portion of all RichLee Bag proceeds will be donated to surviving family members of suicide victims, she said.
