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TaleGator Hoping to Emerge as Licensed Stalwart
December 9, 2008
TaleGator arrived at the Sports Licensing & Tailgate Show last January knowing it had found the perfect audience for its innovative seating system. Inventor Joe Fournier had originally created the product because he had spent far too many uncomfortable hours sitting on the tailgate of his truck watching his kids at soccer games and other sporting events. As Keith Leigh-Monstevens says, “We are selling fun, not just a big plastic molded seat.”
The outlook for TaleGator has improved even more in the months since. Former NFL star Lomas Brown and Jack Lengyel, the legendary coach who took over the Marshall football program after the team’s tragic plane crash in 1970, have both thrown their weight behind the project. Brown was actually on hand when TaleGator made its debut in Las Vegas. He and Lengyel are now key players in the latest news on the product.
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“We’ve signed licensing deals with Florida and Marshall,” says Leigh-Monstevens. “Lomas and Jack have been the real helping force. We’ll be exhibiting the Florida and Marshall versions of the TaleGator at the next Sports Licensing & Tailgate Show.”
According to Leigh-Monstevens, that is the first step in a plan to significantly expand the branding of the TaleGator. “We’re looking at the entire tailgating experience,” he says. The company is currently in the process of making the “Baby TaleGator,” which will fit smaller trucks.
Crucial
to the company’s strategy, of course, is increasing
distribution of the TaleGator. Leigh-Monstevens sees that
as a no-brainer. “All you have to do is sit on it,”
he says. “The TaleGator is comfortable and easy to
take on and off. It’s the only product of its kind
on the market.”
