The Sharper Image plans comeback, "Inventor's Lab" for innovation
Readying itself for the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas is none other than The Sharper Image. From a PR blast:
I’d like to schedule a briefing at next month's CES with one of America's most widely recognized consumer brands, The Sharper Image. This iconic company - known for its cool gadgets and home electronics - is back in business, but this time not as a retailer. Federico de Bellegarde, VP of Licensing at The Sharper Image will be available for a brief time to share with you the company’s transformation to a global licensor of consumer products. He can discuss upcoming product roll-outs that will span numerous lifestyle categories, plus the formation of an open “Inventors’ Lab” for ongoing product innovation and development.
If not the womb of retail gadgetry, The Sharper Image was certainly its cervix, and many of us have fond memories of its metallic plastic nostril shavers, juddering recliners and waterproof in-shower compact disc players. The resurrection follows a buyout by a group of private investors.
The WSJ reported a while back that Sharper Image was to become a brand-licensing outfit, like Commodore, allowing other manufacturers to use the name but not making anything itself. How this "open" development lab turns out will be interesting.
Alas, the website is still dark.
Previously:
Photo: OpenEnd
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Are they going to honor the massive amount of money tied up in gift cards that they failed to honor when they closed? That was pretty awful.
Once I was an adult, I saw them as a crap vendor like Brando, not so much cool but junky and appealing to 12-year-olds and balding 42-year-olds that still think like 12-year-olds.
Most of their stuff was overpriced crap, right? That's what it seemed like when I looked at it. (Except when I was a kid; then it seemed magical and perfect.)
Recently was flying and therefore was accosted by Sky Mall (cf. http://www.amazon.com/SkyMaul-Happy-Crap-You-Plane/dp/B00150B2XS/ ) which is now featuring the first few offerings from a company called Richard Solo. New "merch" from "the founder of The Sharper Image."
Not sure what to think. I guess the iPhone emergency battery with built in LED flashlight and laser pointer is perhaps useful. I find the most interesting thing about it that it looks a lot like the iPhone it's attaching to, giving you a "double-iPhone."
As my pal the herpetologist used to say, "It's not the size, but how many you have."
JEEZZZZUZ if your going to resurrect something please make it something WORTH resurrecting!
Are they going to honor the massive amount of money tied up in gift cards that they failed to honor when they closed?
No. That's why they're not re-opening as a retailer. This way they don't have to worry about all the people they cheated.
The funny part to me is the idea that a brand known primarily for overpriced crap is somehow worth something, particularly after all the people they screwed over with the gift card deal.
"Night-vision goggles? A bathroom scale from a Soviet sub? A suede briefcase-case? Anyone who needs this kind of status symbol must have terrible emotional problems."
Ok, I know there are a lot of negative comments, and probably rightly so. But, they did have a few things I really liked. Most of all, I love my sound machine/radio/alarm clock/cd player. Has tons of different white noise sounds--much more than I've been able to find elsewhere. It even picks up a couple of tv stations, sound only. My hubby used to use this feature when he got up at 5 in the morning to go into work early so he wouldn't wake me up, but he could catch the news. We use it every night and it is hard to be without it when we travel. I am very much dreading the day ours dies on us. Without the Sharper Image, there's no way to replace it and nothing similar out there that we've found. And yes, we have looked.