New Product Awards Blog

There are 16 new product awards categories in the 2013 Stevie® Awards for Sales & Customer Service, the world's top  honors for contact center, customer service, business development, and sales professionals. (All organizations and individuals worldwide are eligible to submit entries for sales awards and customer service awards. January 15, 2013 is the last day that late entries will be accepted; you can download your entry kit here.)

Our new product and service awards categories recognize new and new-version solutions for sales, contact center, and customer service operations.  Any type of product or service offering may be nominated in these categories. Our business awards categories include:

1. Business Intelligence Solution – New
2. Business Intelligence Solution – New Version
3. Collaboration Solution – New
4. Collaboration Solution– New Version
5. Contact Center Solution – New
6. Contact Center Solution – New Version
7. Incentive Management Solution – New
8. Incentive Management Solution – New Version
9. IVR or Web Service Solution – New
10. IVR or Web Service Solution – New Version
11. Marketing Solution – New
12. Marketing Solution – New Version
13. Relationship Management Solution – New
14. Relationship Management Solution – New Version
15. Sales Automation Solution – New
16. Sales Automation Solution – New Version       

Information required for entries in these categories include:

1. An essay of up to 500 words describing the nominee’s accomplishments since July 1, 2011. 
2. A brief biography (up to 100 words) of the leader of the nominated product or service development team.
3. Optional (but highly recommended), a collection of supporting files and web addresses that you may upload to our server to support your entry and provide more background information to the judges.

Our 2012 new product and service Gold Stevie® Award winners include: Donlen (Business Intelligence Solution – New), LeanLogistics (Business Intelligence Solution – New Version), Enterasys (Collaboration Solution – New), ISOdx Solutions (Contact Center Solution – New Version), FedEx (IVR or Web Service Solution – New), Schedulicity (IVR or Web Service Solution – New Version), Salesforce (Marketing Solution – New), Aprimo (Marketing Solution – New Version), Broadview Networks (Relationship Management Solution – New), Groupcars (Sales Automation Solution – New), and Eloqua (Sales Automation Solution – New Version).

Finalists will be notified on January 23 and 2013 honorees will be celebrated at the 7th annual awards banquet at Paris Las Vegas, Nevada, USA on February 25.

Need help deciding which category your should enter?  Email us at help@stevieawards.com  or call us at + 1 703-547-8389.

There are 49 Best New Product or Service of the Year categories in The 2013 (11th Annual) American Business Awards, the premier business awards program in the U.S.A. (Friday, November 16, is the first early-bird entry deadline for the 2013 ABAs, request your entry kit here  and you'll receive it right away.)

Products and services introduced to the marketplace since January 1, 2012 are eligible for our new product awards and nominees may be brand new or new versions. Our product of the year awards categories include:

• Business-to-Business Products
• Business-to-Business Services    
• Consumer Electronics
• Consumer Products
• Consumer Services
• Financial Services
• Hardware
     a. Computer
     b. Networking
     c. Peripheral
     d. Semiconductor or Other Electronic Component
     e. Storage
     f. Other
• Health & Pharmaceuticals
     a. Product
     b. Service
• Industrial Products & Services
• Media & Entertainment
     a. Product
     b. Service
• Software
     a. Asset Management Solution
     b. Business or Competitive Intelligence Solution
     c. Cloud Application/Service
     d. Cloud Infrastructure
     e. Cloud Platform
     f. Collaboration/Social Networking Solution
     g. Content Management Solution
     h. Corporate Learning/Workforce Development Solution
     i. Database Innovation
     j. Document Management Solution
     k. Electronic Commerce Solution
     l. Financial Management Solution
     m. Human Capital Management Solution
     n. Integration Solution
     o. International Data Protection Solution
     p. Marketing/Public Relations Solution
     q. Mobile On-Demand Application
     r. Mobile Operations Management Solution
     s. Project Management Solution
     t. Relationship Management Solution
     u. Security Solution
     v. Software Development Solution
     w. Supply Chain Management Solution
     x. Systems Management Solution
     y. Web Services Solution
     z. Other
• Telecommunications
     a. Hardware
     b. Service
• Transportation

Every new product that's nominated in the new product or service of the year categories will automatically be included in voting for the People's Choice Stevie Awards for Favorite New Products.  Public voting will open in July, and the winners will be honored at The American Business Awards' tech awards ceremony in San Francisco in September 2013.

Our product management awards include:

• Product Development/Management Department or Team of the Year
• Product Development/Management Executive of the Year
• Product Developer of the Year (for all non-executive product development or management professionals)

The following information is generally required for product awards and product management submissions:

• An essay of up to 525 words describing the nominee's achievements since January 1, 2012.  For the best new product or service of the year categories, this should be an essay about your product or service: Its features, functions, benefits, and performance to date,
• A biography of the nominee or the leader of the nominated company, department, or team of up to 125 words, and
• Optional (but highly recommended), a collection of supporting files, product demonstration videos, and/or web addresses that you may upload to our server to support your entry and provide more background information to the judges

Need help deciding which new product or service award you should apply for? Call us at + 1 703-547-8389 or email us at help@stevieawards.com.

iolo technologies of Los Angeles, CA USA won a Stevie® Award for Best New Product or Service of the Year in the new product awards categories of 2011 International Business Awards, the world's premier business awards  program. (The final entry deadline for the 2012 IBAs is 27 June. All organizations and individuals worldwide are eligible to submit entries, request your entry kit today.) Here iolo technologies shares their best new product story.

Since its founding in 1998, iolo technologies has been producing award-winning software that repairs, optimizes, and protects Windows computers. With many proprietary technologies developed in house, iolo launched System Mechanic10, a performance software that continues to lead and re-define the critical PC tune-up software.

In 2010 alone, System Mechanic10:

1. Became available in 40 countries worldwide, for a 22 percent expansion rate in 2010 alone. It is now sold across South America and in more than 18,000 U.S. storefronts, including all major retailers such as Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, Best Buy, Office Depot, Staples.

2. Established and/or maintained #1 best-selling position in eight of those countries, including US, Canada, France, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Spain. In 2010, System Mechanic’s share of the PC tune-up market in the U.S. numbered 85 percent and in Canada, 98 percent.

3. Introduced a Spanish version and quickly established #1 best-selling position in that country. iolo’s System Mechanic is now available in six languages, including English, Dutch, French, German, Italian and Spanish.

4. Grew its worldwide customer base from 30 to 36 million, for a 20 percent increase.

5. Introduced several significant new features. System Mechanic now includes:

• Industry-first, exclusive Program Accelerator and Tune-up Definitions
• Industry-first CRUDD Remover, an intelligent program removal tool
• Patented ActiveCare automatic maintenance technology
• Advanced Windows 7-focused technology and features
• The most robust and advanced registry tools

6. Secured a patent for its innovative and industry-first ActiveCare automatic maintenance technology in Jan 2011.

7. Won 28 major awards worldwide, including:

• PC Magazine, Product of the Year and Editors’ Choice
• Government Computer News, Reviewer’s Choice
• MicroMart (UK), Editor’s Choice
• Computer Active (UK), Buy It
• PC Advisor (UK), Product of the Year
• PC Actual (Spain), Recommended Product
• Micro Actuel (France), Editor’s Choice
• Winmag Pro Magazine (Netherlands), Editor’s Choice
• PC Magazine (Middle East), Editor’s Choice

8. Created significant green benefits for its users. 82 percent of US computers end up in landfills after only 30 months of use, mostly to make way for new technology.

iolo’s System Mechanic10 helps consumers and businesses alike use their aging computers for longer, minimizing computer frustrations, limiting time wasted because of computer delays and irresponsiveness, hardware replacements costs and e-waste. With iolo’s strong focus on customer satisfaction, quality products, and always-relevant technology, System Mechanic10 is poised to garner even more awards and happy customers in 2012.

About iolo technologies
Crowned the Fastest-Growing Company in the U.S. in 2010 and 2009 by American Business Awards, iolo technologies produces award-winning software that repairs, optimizes, and protects Windows computers. Founded in 1998 and headquartered in Los Angeles, iolo technologies has presence in 40 countries and 6 languages, 36 million users worldwide, and hundreds of awards from industry analysts and media.

The final entry deadline for The 2012 International Business Awards, the world's premier business awards competition, is quickly approaching on 27 June. All individuals and organizations worldwide – public and private, for-profit and non-profit, large and small – may submit nominations to the IBAs. If you haven't yet done so, you can request your entry kit today.

Here we share three new product awards tips to help you showcase your organization's achievements.

1. Review the business awards categories.
There are several awards categories honoring new products and product management at the 2012 IBAs including:

• Best New Product or Service of the Year  
• Product Development/Management Department or Team of the Year
• Product Development/Management Executive of the Year

2. Review the entry submission criteria.
The information requirements for entries in these new product and product management awards categories are generally:

• An essay of up to 500 words describing the nominee's achievements since 1 January 2011.  For the Best New Product or Service of the Year categories, this should be an essay about your product or service: Its features, functions, benefits, and performance to date.
• A biography of the nominee or the leader of the nominated company, department, or team of up to 100 words.
• Optional (but highly recommended), a collection of supporting files, product demonstration videos, and/or web addresses that you may upload to our server to support your entry and provide more background information to the judges.

3. Review past winners' entries.
The 8th Annual International Business Awards were presented in October 2011 in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates. 2011 new product and product management honorees included:

• iolo technologies
• SDL International
• Manthan Systems
• American Express
• Cascades Tissue Group
• BioExx Specialty Proteins Ltd.
• Dudu Communications Fz. LLC.
• Abu Dhabi Systems & Information Centre
• Telegent Systems
• Pegasus Solutions, Inc.
• Eagle's Flight Creative Training Excellence Inc.

Winners of the competition will be celebrated at the ninth annual awards banquet on Monday, 15 October at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Seoul, South Korea.

Not sure which category is right for your organization? Email us at help@stevieawards.com and we'll direct you to the appropriate categories.

Cascades Tissue Group of Candiac, Canada, won a Stevie® Award for Best New Product or Service of the Year in the new product awards categories of 2011 International Business Awards, the world's premier business awards  program. (The 2012 IBAs are now open for entries. All organizations and individuals worldwide are eligible to submit entries. The entry deadline is 16 May, request your entry kit today.) Here Cascades Tissue shares their best new product story.

Intelligent Inspiration
In 2004, after the outbreak of SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) had nearly became a worldwide pandemic, the marketing department at Cascades Tissue Group developed an idea for a paper tissue product that would provide additional protection from contamination by hand contact.

Intelligent Facts
While it is well known that good hand hygiene is the best way to reduce the spread of bacteria, research shows that 50% of people still do not wash their hands after visiting the bathroom. Of those who do, most don’t wash their hands for the recommended 20 to 30 seconds and don’t dry them thoroughly for an extra 10-20 seconds.

Since 80% of infections are transmitted by hand contact, the Cascades project aimed to introduce an antimicrobial agent to dry-paper hand towels that would only be released when it came into contact with wet hands.  And so Intelligent Paper® was created.

Intelligent Launch
It took five years of R&D and several third-party tests by experts at universities in Ontario and Quebec, and at external labs in the United States, before the emerging technology, Cascades Intelligent® antibacterial hand towel, could be launched on May 18th, 2010, a world first.

Cascades describes their product of the year as Intelligent™ because it compensates for people’s improper hand hygiene habits without changing their way of doing things. When in contact with wet hands, the Intelligent Paper® releases and transfers to hands an active ingredient, benzalkonium chloride, which is also found in other products in similar concentrations such as eye drops. Almost instantly, it significantly reduces bacteria left on hands and provides an antibacterial protection for more than 30 minutes, something that no other hand hygiene products, such as alcohol-based hand sanitizers, offer. The product is effective even in areas with limited water supply since it requires only 3 to 5 ml of water to activate the antibacterial ingredient.

Eco-Intelligent
The environmentally preferable Cascades Intelligent® antibacterial hand towel is made with 100% recycled fibers, and is recyclable, compostable, and biodegradable. Its green color makes it easy to identify from regular paper hand towels. The technology innovation is also safe, odorless, and non-irritating for skin.

Intelligent Benefits
Cascades Intelligent® antibacterial hand towel offers many benefits for the consumer; for industries such as food services, food processing, healthcare, and transportation; and for education markets.

• First, paper towels are already regularly used during hand washing. Consequently, users of the Intelligent® antibacterial paper towel don’t have to change their habits or add a step during the hand washing process and will stay protected against subsequent bacterial contamination for a significant time period.

• Secondly, by reducing the quantity of residual bacteria on hands, the Intelligent® paper reduces the risk of contamination. Companies using this product enhance the importance of hygiene for their employees.

• Finally, there is no expiration date, so storage procedures do not have to be changed.

Intelligent Approval
Cascades Tissue Group holds a patent pending on the manufacturing process and the product, as well as a trademark on its green color. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has issued a letter of non-objection for the Intelligent® hand towel paper and considers that there is no risk in handling food after its use. The Cascades Intelligent® antibacterial hand towel is currently available in Canada.

Intelligent Awards
The Cascades Intelligent® antibacterial hand towel recently received a Stevie Award for Best New Product or Service of the Year at the 8th International Business Awards ceremony which took place in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, last October.

“We are proud to have been recognized by this prestigious award for our new antibacterial hand towel,” said Nathalie Comeau, Innovation Director for the Cascades Tissue Group’s Away-from-Home division in North America and the person who initiated the creation of the Intelligent® antibacterial paper. “Cascades has invested more than five years in R&D for its antibacterial paper hand towel and this new award confirms the need and the great market potential for this major innovation.”

About Nathalie Comeau:
Nathalie Comeau is Innovation Director for the Away-from-Home division in North America and is the person behind the concept for Intelligent Antibacterial Paper. She has been with Cascades for over 20 years, first working in sales and marketing. Her experience in the paper industry, combined with her creative ideas, led her to see the potential of such a product and to convince the company to invest in this project.

About Cascades Tissue Group:
Founded in 1964, Cascades produces, converts, and markets packaging and tissue products composed mainly of recycled fiber. Cascades employs more than 11,000 employees who work in over 100 production units located in North America and Europe. Cascades' management philosophy, its more than 45 years of experience in recycling, and its continued efforts in research and development are strengths which enable the company to create new products for its customers. The Cascades shares trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol CAS.

There are 24 best new product or service awards categories in The 2012 International Business Awards, the world's premier business awards program to help you highlight your organization's product of the year. (The 2012 IBAs are now accepting entries. Download your entry kit here and begin submitting your entries by the 16 May entry deadline.) All products and services introduced to the marketplace since 1 January 2011 are eligible for consideration. Nominees may be brand new or new versions.

Our new product awards categories include:

• Business-to-Business Products
• Business-to-Business Services    
• Consumer Electronics
• Consumer Products
• Consumer Services
• Financial Services
• Hardware (Computer, Networking, Peripheral, Semiconductor or Other Electronic Component, Storage, Other)
• Health & Pharmaceuticals
     a. Product
     b. Service
• Industrial Products & Services
• Media & Entertainment
     a. Product
     b. Service
• Software
     a. New
     b. New Version
• Telecommunications
     a. Hardware
     b. Service
• Transportation
• Other
• Product Development/Management Department or Team of the Year
• Product Development/Management Executive of the Year

Generally, the information required for product awards and product management submissions include:

• An essay of up to 500 words describing the nominee's achievements since 1 January 2011.  For the Best New Product or Service of the Year categories, this should be an essay about your product or service: Its features, functions, benefits, and performance to date
• A biography of the nominee or the leader of the nominated company, department, or team of up to 100 words
• Optional (but highly recommended), a collection of supporting files, product demonstration videos, and/or web addresses that you may upload to our server to support your entry and provide more background information to the judges

Leave us a comment and let us know which of your organization's products and services you'll be submitting entries for by 16 May.

There are 51 Best New Product or Service of the Year categories in The 2012 (10th Annual) American Business Awards, the premier business awards program in the U.S.A. The entry deadline is quickly approaching on March 28, request your entry kit here.

Our new product awards categories include:

• Business-to-Business Products
• Business-to-Business Services    
• Consumer Electronics
• Consumer Products
• Consumer Services
• Financial Services
• Hardware
     a. Computer
     b. Networking
     c. Peripheral
     d. Semiconductor or Other Electronic Component
     e. Storage
     f. Other
• Health & Pharmaceuticals
     a. Product
     b. Service
• Industrial Products & Services
• Media & Entertainment
     a. Product
     b. Service
• Software
     a. Asset Management Solution
     b. Business or Competitive Intelligence Solution
     c. Cloud Application/Service
     d. Cloud Infrastructure
     e. Cloud Platform
     f. Collaboration/Social Networking Solution
     g. Content Management Solution
     h. Corporate Learning/Workforce Development Solution
     i. Database Innovation
     j. Document Management Solution
     k. Electronic Commerce Solution
     l. Financial Management Solution
     m. Human Capital Management Solution
     n. Integration Solution
     o. International Data Protection Solution
     p. Marketing/Public Relations Solution
     q. Mobile On-Demand Application
     r. Mobile Operations Management Solution
     s. Project Management Solution
     t. Relationship Management Solution
     u. Security Solution
     v. Software Development Solution
     w. Supply Chain Management Solution
     x. Systems Management Solution
     y. Web Services Solution
     z. Other
• Telecommunications
     a. Hardware
     b. Service
• Transportation

Products and services introduced to the marketplace since January 1, 2011 are eligible for our product of the year awards and nominees may be brand new or new versions.

The following information is generally required for product awards and product management submissions:

• An essay of up to 500 words describing the nominee's achievements since January 1, 2011.  For the best new product or service of the year categories, this should be an essay about your product or service: Its features, functions, benefits, and performance to date,
• A biography of the nominee or the leader of the nominated company, department, or team of up to 100 words, and
• Optional (but highly recommended), a collection of supporting files, product demonstration videos, and/or web addresses that you may upload to our server to support your entry and provide more background information to the judges

Every new product that's nominated in the new product or service of the year categories will automatically be included in voting for the People's Choice Stevie Awards for Favorite New Products.  Public voting will open in July, and the winners will be honored at The American Business Awards' new tech awards ceremony in San Francisco in September 2012.

Need help deciding which new product or service award you should apply for? Call us at + 1 703-547-8389 or email us at help@stevieawards.com.

Payments management company Litle & Co of Lowell, Massachusetts, USA won a Stevie® Award for Best New IVR or Web Service Solution in the new product awards categories of the 2011 Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Ben Saren, their VP of Marketing, will Chair the committee for final judging of the New Product & Service categories in the 2012 edition of the awards, which is accepting entries through January 18 (get your entry kit here).

As online credit card transactions increase, so do the risks. We look at how Litle & Co. is reducing these risks.

Industry statistics in the United States suggest that there were more than 900 data breaches involving more than 900 million credit card records in 2009 alone, yet the majority of merchants still keep customers’ credit card numbers on file.

Meanwhile, the Payment Card Industry (PCI) standards for data security are still evolving as they relate to Data Loss Protection (DLP) technologies.

Ahead of the Competition

Litle & Co. has developed a forward-looking solution that protects consumer data. The company believes that tokenization is the next step in enabling safe removal of sensitive cardholder data from merchant systems. The company is ahead of other solution vendors in proactively addressing vulnerabilities in the payment chain of card transactions in order to protect merchants and, ultimately, consumers.

“We believe that best practice approaches in business-to-business customer service should include those in which the design, goal, and benefit is focused not just on the customer, but also on the customer’s customer,” said Jason Pavona, Executive Vice President, Product Management at Litle & Co.  “Our product vision is simple: Build, develop, and implement solutions that help our customers create more secure, more enduring, and more profitable relationships with their customers.”

The Litle Vault, introduced in September 2010, is a web-driven, platform-integrated, tokenization solution that enables card-not-present (CNP) merchants to safely remove sensitive cardholder data from their systems without disrupting any existing card transaction-based process.  The service is delivered directly to Litle’s customers, and therefore to their customers, through the Litle payment-processing platform.

Tokens replace credit card numbers for all payment transactions including
authorizations, deposits, and chargebacks. 

Handling the Customers’ Data

Litle Vault removes merchants’ data security encumbrances so they can focus on selling. Instead, the onus of handling most of the data management is moved to Litle & Co, so the merchants’ customers’ card data exists only on an offsite server that specializes in handling payment data.

The Vault makes electronic commerce more efficient, safe, and profitable by:

• Reducing the scope of PCI Compliance

Whenever sensitive cardholder data is replaced with a token and used in association with operational areas such as acceptance of online payments, cardholder data storage, and chargeback processing, it can reduce the scope of PCI audits and associated costs by as much as 60%.

• Minimizing the risk from potential data breaches

Data breaches do and will happen. However, with the Vault, hackers cannot steal what merchants don’t have: the customer’s credit card information. In the event tokens are compromised, cyber-thieves will quickly find that the tokens are completely worthless to them.

• Centralizing credit card security and reducing data exposure

Once registered, a single token can be used by anyone in an organization, mitigating the time-consuming and often costly process of having to encrypt, decrypt, and re-encrypt information each time someone touches a customer’s credit card.

• Eliminating insurance costs

Tokenization is a preventive measure that minimizes the cost of a data breach risk. It also potentially enables a merchant to eliminate certain onerous insurance premiums that can often run to hundreds of thousands of dollars. With tokenization, a component of the Errors and Omissions (E&O) Liability Insurance premium cost—typically $0.60 per card annually—can be eliminated.

Industry Endorsement

“Tokenization of payment card data has quickly become a must-have for e-commerce and direct-response merchants whose web presence exposes them to a great deal of breach risk and who are seeking to reduce their PCI scope,” said David Fish, Senior Analyst at Mercator Advisory Group, the leading research and consulting firm focused on the payments industry.  “Litle & Co. has earned the reputation of a trusted partner in the card-not-present space, where their expertise in dealing with transaction data security in card processing environments has coalesced in … Litle Vault."

About Jason Pavone
Jason brings more than 15 years of product development, direct marketing, sales, and entrepreneurial experience to Litle & Co.  Jason leads Litle’s Sales & Marketing strategy, which includes business development and sales; product strategy and development; brand awareness marketing and communications; and partner communities and initiatives.  Before joining Litle, Jason served as a Partner of Enflect, LLC, which developed several product companies in the payment, loyalty, financial services, and software industries.  Prior to Enflect, Jason developed Wallaware, Inc., a wireless router company, where he drove the company’s first U.S and International sales, raised several rounds of private equity capital, and opened operations in the US and internationally.  Before Wallaware, Jason was Director of Wireless and Personalization at Terra Lycos, a top-three most-visited Internet destination.  At Terra Lycos he created some of the first wireless portal solutions, available in 30 countries under the brand Lycos Anywhere®.   He also managed Terra Lycos’s Network Personalization products, including MyLycos®, the award-winning personalization destination with 20 million registered users. Before Terra Lycos, Jason was instrumental in building INPHO, Inc. (including domania.com, which today is part of IAC’s LendingTree), a pioneer in the Internet real estate space.  Jason received a bachelor’s degree in Finance and Entrepreneurial Studies from Babson College.

About Litle
Litle & Co. is the payment-processing engine behind leading ecommerce and consumer-direct digital brands including Overstock.com, Ancestry.com, Gilt Groupe, CSN Stores, and Guthy-Renker.  Founded in 2001, the company’s customer-obsessed culture is committed to Voice of the Customer initiatives, including Net Promoter Score (NPS). Litle & Co won the 2010 Stevie® Award for eCommerce Customer Service and the 2011 Stevie® Award for product and service innovation for its tokenization solution Litle Vault.  To learn more about Litle & Co. visit http://www.litle.com, or call 1-800-548-5326 (1-800-LITLECO) or 978-275-6500.

Agloves® of Boulder, Colorado USA won Stevie Awards for Best New Product of the Year and Best New Company of the Year in the 2011 Stevie Awards for Women in Business. We asked the mother-and-daughter team behind this successful company how they came up with their innovative idea.  (All of the Stevie Awards competitions have new product awards categories - check out the categories in the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service - final entry deadline of January 18 2012).

In February 2010, when Jennifer Spencer went to Washington D.C. to visit her daughter, Jean, it was extremely cold and the streets were lined with dirty snow. Jean, who was working as an intern for the Wall Street Journal, was using an iPhone to keep in touch with her office.  While walking along the street, Jean told her mother: “Mom, I am missing calls from my Editor.  When my phone rings, I have to find my phone in my bag, pull off my gloves with my teeth, and then shove them in my pocket in order to take the call.”  She added: “You have to invent gloves that work on touch screens!”

Jean was simply echoing the problem that smartphone and tablet users know only too well: regular gloves don’t work on touch screens. Fortunately for Jean, her mother is both an entrepreneur and a woman of great resourcefulness. The idea intrigued her.

How Do Touch Screens Work?

Jennifer began by studying how touch screens work. Contrary to popular belief, touch screens are not heat sensitive.  They are capacitive, meaning that the screens respond when tiny amounts of moisture, salts, and oils in the skin allow electrons to flow between you and your device. However, when something non-conductive comes between you and your device—such as an ordinary pair of gloves—the touch screen doesn’t respond and the device won’t work.

For Jennifer, the solution was obvious: Create a warm glove that would be able to conduct the body’s own bioelectricity to the capacitive touch screen.

A Warm—and Anti-Microbial—Solution

And so a new product was born: Agloves®. Ag is the symbol for silver on the periodic table and is the most conductive element. With Agloves, the body’s natural bioelectricity flows through the glove to your touch screen device and maintains near-perfect connection.

Agloves combine a snug, user-friendly design with tech-savvy functionality. The gloves deliver incredible accuracy and intuitive operation. Wearers can swipe, pinch, and pull their touch screens at the same speed they would with bare hands. An added bonus is that, in addition to being conductive, silver is a thermal regulator, making the gloves warmer than most knit gloves—and antimicrobial.

Beating the Competition

The next step was to commercialize the product. Circumventing the traditional brick and mortar retail strategy, Agloves launched its ecommerce website on September 29, 2010.

Working as a mother-daughter team, Jennifer and Jean used an innovative social media strategy to introduce their new product. While their new company was not able to afford television advertising, it needed to level the playing field when it came to competition from other computer accessory and glove companies. And that is exactly what Agloves did by its savvy use of social media.

Agloves received wide online media coverage. The gloves were acknowledged as one of CNET’s “Best of CES 2011” and among MSNBC’s “Top Winter Gadgets 2010.” PCMag included Agloves in its "Best Winter Gadget List 2011," and MacWorld gave Agloves four mice.  Other media coverage included Fox Business News, The New York Times, Yahoo News, AP, National Public Radio, and Gizmodo.com.

What’s Not to (Ag)Love?

By December 2010, Agloves touch screen gloves had sold in 43 countries and were selling at a rate of a pair a minute. Tech-savvy consumers around the globe are falling in love with Agloves.

About Jennifer and Jean Spencer

Jennifer Spencer is a creative thinker and entrepreneur who has been instrumental in myriad start-up companies and innovations over the last 20 years. Jennifer's marketing and business development strategies have provided successful solutions for her clients. Jennifer is president of Agloves.

Jean Spencer is VP of Communication. After receiving a bachelor’s degree in Journalism, Jean decided to take a leap from the world of newsprint into the world of online communications. Jean heads all things social, communicative, and networked for Agloves including media relations, PR, social media, and the company’s online presence.

About AGloves

Agloves® is a patent-pending winter touch screen glove company.  The Boulder, Colorado-based business launched September 29, 2010 and currently employs seven people.  Agloves was globally successful right from the start.  Within three months of launching the business, Agloves had sold roughly 60,000 pairs of gloves in 43 countries worldwide from their online store, www.Agloves.com.   Agloves is currently expanding into retail sales in the European Union.