The Story of Picture Pages

Where did Picture Pages come from?

I had been married to Carol Sadowski for just over 10 years when Carol was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer. We fought as hard as possible, but to no avail. Carol passed away February 15, 1997. Carol & I had 2 sons together, Paul II and Michael. Carol was also the memory person of the family, (this immediate family and the rest of her extended family). Through the years Carol had kept a lot of her parent’s family photos in boxes and I had a lot of photos stored in boxes and even rolls of film that had never even been developed (remember what life was like when you had to develop photos on physical film before printing them?). There were a lot of memories here and there. Carol also kept a lot of photos of the boys and other family photos on walls and displayed on shelves, almost to the point of just looking like clutter. After she passed I hired a nanny to help with Paul and Mike and to keep the house up while I was at work. It didn’t take too long before a relationship between the new nanny and I formed.

The Picture Pages story actually began as just a thought not long after this new relationship began. Whilst Carol was ill the house was kept clean, but we had lived here for almost 10 years by the time she passed away and it was in need of updating - paint, carpet, furniture, etc. I gave the nanny the ability and permission to start to redecorate. First was going to be the basement - it was all concrete walls and an old drop ceiling, but it had never quite been finished. When the prices came in, the basement was put off until later. One bedroom and the main bath were done first, and then the living and dining room were done. At the time the living and dining room were done she asked if it was ok to put some of the photos away in boxes, I said that would be fine. She took all of the photos down and put them carefully and neatly away and explained that she felt like she was living too much in the past. I accepted that, but started pondering ways to satisfy both my feelings as well as hers.

My mind went back to the basement and I thought that instead of using paneling or drywall on the walls I would find solid panels that would be 4 feet tall and 2 feet wide, so I could display each year of my life on its own page (panel) on one wall and she could put a year of hers on each page (panel) on another wall and then our lives together on a third wall. This way when people come to visit they will be able to share in memories, but it should never get real boring and the photos would be in the open, so they don’t have to ask if they can see them.

I started looking for the panels that I would need and then I knew I would have to design some kind of a hinge mechanism, it seemed like that would be pretty easy to find, but they didn’t exist. I remember wondering how this would work and I thought back to high school and remembered that there was a book type thing that was in the hallway of years and years of graduating classes, I thought well that might work, but the pages would stick out and we wouldn’t have any space left in the basement by the time we had a few pages in each book (it needed to lay flat against the wall).

For a while I gave up on the idea and would suggest the idea to some people that I would come in contact with, I am a finance manager in car dealerships, so I come into contact with a lot of people in different walks of life. I thought maybe someone had seen something that would work or maybe someone would get ambitious and steal the idea, so I could at least buy them somewhere. That never happened. After the house was redecorated and we had spent a couple of years together finally the relationship between the nanny and I fizzled.

There had been another woman that I worked with that had been flirting back and forth with me. We had investigated the possibility of getting together before, but I had felt that it would create too many changes for Paul and Mike to deal with. This time though, it was time to see what life had to offer us. That’s when Linda (now my current wife and CEO of “Picture Pages”) and I started dating. The second time we went out we took Paul II and Mike with us and went bowling, I think that it was on this first time they called her mom (I guess they thought it was time for a change too); this was late in 1999. I told Linda about my brainstorm and she reminded me that we wouldn’t know if it would work if we didn’t try to make it work.

But I still couldn’t find the parts that I needed. I tried using Plexiglas panels with steel rods attached and they were too brittle and the rods didn’t stay well enough and I still had to find a way to hold them back against the wall. I played with different ideas now and then, but I was still working in the finance office about 65 hours a week, so this idea would have to wait. It still kept tugging at me and we would talk about it now and then, but we didn’t know what to do.

In July of 2000 we went on our annual houseboat trip and were talking about this idea in the car and I remembered about a good friend of mine that is a printer. So I put a call into Bob and asked him if he knew of a material that would work for this idea. He advised me that I was still as crazy as he used to think I was and this would be too expensive to ever make financial sense. I respected his opinion and told Linda that he had returned my call while I was getting gas and what he had said. So we put it on hold again. Later that same year we were watching TV at the holidays and there was a commercial for Invent-tech. When I saw that commercial I told her that we could check with them and see if there was already something like this idea that existed.

I called the number from the TV and was told that for $100 they would do a patent search. We discussed the fact, that for $100 we could find out who makes panels like this and buy them. That would certainly be cheaper than the time and gas that I had been spending by running around and looking for them in person. So we gave them the credit card for the $100 and they called back about 2 or three days later and said nothing like that exists anywhere in the world.

The next step was the one that started the rest of the process. They told me that with nothing like this in existence; it might be an idea worth pursuing. I talked to Linda and asked if we wanted to take a big chance and let her know that this next step would require a $9000 investment, but since there was nothing like it, we might be onto something. She agreed that Gordie Howe always said that if you don’t take the shot, you can’t score the goal. With that being said, I pulled out our Discover card and had them get started. The company said that they would register the patents, which gave me one year to finalize my thoughts. I then got anxious about how I would make this idea work and wanted to make a prototype, again I thought they were supposed to do this for me, but they reminded me that they don’t do the prototype until they find an interested manufacturer.

I went looking for parts to make my own prototype and ended up at a plastic distributor near our home and tried to explain what I was doing without describing “Picture Pages” in any detail …and it got quite confusing for us all. So it was then recommended that I have their legal department approve a confidentiality agreement, which they did. I then tried to meet with their Vice President who, so it turned out, didn’t really have much time for me after all.

Finally, after we tried to meet on numerous occasions over a period of about three months he told me that they only sell bulk plastic, and they don’t get involved in final production, especially with a brand new product. He did like the fact that I had some drawings and a new idea, but it just wasn’t what they do in their business. For some reason he seemed to feel bad about the time I had put into this project and instead of just turning me away he recommended that I see a couple of prototype shops that they use. I went and met with one of the prototype manufacturers and although he had a lot of work in the shop, he wanted to help when he could.

I then went and met Charlie at Down River Plastics in Michigan and he drew me a picture of what I was thinking within the first ten minutes we were together. I asked if he could build it and he had it done inside of a week. He did it in a size that was feasible to manufacture at a reasonable cost (15” x 15”) instead of the 2 feet by 4 feet that I had originally wanted. I then asked if he could make them in different colors, he let me know that the plastic he used was available in ten colors, so I asked him to make me three in each color. That’s when I actually found out that a registered patent is different than a patent that is filed and pending. With this new fire lit under me, I urgently went about finding a proper patent attorney. Finally I found Arnie Weintraub through my pre-paid legal membership.

Arnie took the prototype and had technical drawings done and then filed the patent papers. After the proper papers were filed and Arnie had advised me it was now safe to show the idea around publicly, I asked my boss (Mike Riehl) if it was ok for me to put one on display in my office; and he agreed. I almost immediately put one in my office, a couple in my house, sent one to my mother, another to my sister and asked everyone to give me feedback of what people thought that saw them.

We were heard what a great idea they were, but there were definite problems with this first generation production prototype. The plastic they were made of was constituted in such a way that although I had super glued magnets to the corners of the pages to keep them in place when they were turned some of the magnets were falling off. They also looked too home made.

Then one day whilst I was delivering the paperwork for a new car to Ed and Laurie Smith, I was showing the “Picture Pages” prototype that was hanging in my office to them and Ed asked why the pages were made out of plain plastic sheets instead of being molded plastic (using a plastic injection molding machine). I told him that I had learned that when you mold plastic in a 15” x 15” panel it will warp, he then told me that he had a plastics shop and could mold plastic panels that size that wouldn’t warp and that instead of just gluing magnets in the corners we could insert them into the mold along with the screws that hold the pages in the album’s hinge structure. Wow, what a difference one conversation can make! We went ahead and worked together at perfecting that process.

Now three long years later we have completed this process, added texture to the pages, and have made numerous other improvements. We have also found and assembled a range of accessories to make this a high quality product that we feel we can brag about.

Where did Picture Pages come from?

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