Feb. 25 - Pat Downs knows firsthand the multitude of steps between inventing a product and getting it into the marketplace.

More than two years after Downs and his partners began work on Jenda, a lifetime voice calendar for the home or office, they've yet to put it on store shelves.

"The problem is that the big stores won't take one product from one supplier," said Downs, a Story Hill resident and Milwaukee business owner whose group has sold about 2,000 of the battery-operated devices primarily over the Web and through trade show contacts since getting the first shipment from a manufacturer in December 2006.

But in the past few months, Downs and his partners have taken a big step toward getting Jenda in stores.

"We've found a network to get into stores," said Lora Hyler, whose Mequon firm, Hyler Communications, was brought in to help Downs' group market Jenda. "We've made some contacts and now we have high hopes."

Downs has traveled the invention road before.

His primary business, All-Pak Services LLC -- a firm on Milwaukee's west side that packs, wraps and assembles a variety of products for manufacturers -- had a customer in 1996 that needed a process for quickly applying multiple uniform portions of glue during assembly. Downs and his partner at All-Pak Services, Bob Borovsky, created Glue Dots, like-sized dollops of glue on rolls of wax paper.

The group patented the product and sold it four years later to Ellsworth Adhesives, a Germantown-based corporation that distributes sealants, adhesives, tapes, lubricants and soldering products.

"They were in a business that used them and they turned it into a consumer product extremely against the odds," said Keith Baxter, the Milwaukee patent attorney for Downs and Borovsky. "I like this product (Jenda), but it's a different situation than with glue dots."

Downs, Borovsky and Downs' nephew, John Downs, cooked up the Jenda concept in 2005 as an electronic means of calendaring busy family schedules.

"My husband travels a lot," said Tammy Downs, John Downs' wife. "Keeping track of his schedule and family events was a major difficulty.

"We talked about how nice it would be if we could push a button and find out everything we have scheduled."

With some help from a retired engineer, they paired a perpetual clock with a perpetual calendar that enables a person to program reminders by pressing a few touchpad keys and recording a verbal description of an event, meeting or anniversary to occur on a given day.

When that day arrives, a light blinks, and with more fingerwork, the message is played back. Reminders can be recorded for future days, weeks or years, and the device, smaller than most laptops, can be slapped on a fridge with magnets, affixed to a wall with screws, or placed on a desk or counter.

They're being sold now on the Web for $39.95 each.

Pat Downs decided early on to apply for patents on Jenda's design and software. But Baxter said the decision about seeking a patent usually involves pretty intense soul-searching.

"I think a lot of people with good ideas don't want patents," Baxter said. "The majority of patents are on things that nobody wants to buy.

"That's not to say that they're not good ideas. But a patent for something fairly simple will cost you $10,000 by the time the dust settles, and that's a low number. It could go much higher."

Moreover, the process for obtaining a patent can drag on for two years, and by that time, what seemed like a good product may no longer be in favor, Baxter noted.

"You have to be sure you've got something that will be more than a fad," he said.

In early 2006, Pat Downs and Borovsky contracted with Design Interchange, of Racine, for Jenda's touchpad layout. Then, Pat Downs and Borovsky flew to Singapore, ferried to the island of Batam off the country's south coast and visited HDK Technologies, the company they eventually chose to manufacture Jenda.

In early 2006, Pat Downs and Borovsky contracted with Design Interchange, of Racine, for Jenda's touchpad layout. Then, Pat Downs and Borovsky flew to Singapore, ferried to the island of Batam off the country's south coast and visited HDK Technologies, the company they eventually chose to manufacture Jenda.

In mid-2006, Pat Downs, Borovsky and two silent partners pooled an undisclosed amount of money, took out a line of credit and formed Finger-String Inc., to produce Jenda.

"The name comes from tying a string around your finger to remember something you have to do," Pat Downs explained.

The first shipment of 500 Jendas arrived in December 2006. The partners created a Web site (www.buyjenda.com) to sell Jenda on the Internet, and in the spring of 2007 they ran a commercial on local television in the 4 a.m. to 9 a.m. time slot.

"That (commercial) didn't really seem to do much because there just aren't many people watching television during that period," Pat Downs said.

Finger-String retained Hyler in April 2007 to develop contacts with the media and organizations that involve senior citizens, a group Finger-String believes would find Jenda attractive.

In September 2007, the group attended the national convention for the American Association of Retired Persons in Boston, where they sold about 100 Jendas and made important contacts.

"It was our first national exposure and we developed contacts from all over the country," Hyler said.

One contact landed Jenda in a holiday gift guide and another a mention in Life After 50 magazine.

In December, Finger-String developed a relationship with J S & T Tooling Concepts, a town of Erin marketing firm that specializes in getting inventors' products on store shelves.

"It's a winner product and we've got some preliminary interest," said John Suckow, founder of the agency. "I'm trying to package it with some other products we'd like to get in Wal-Mart or Radio Shack.

"I should know something by the end of this month. This is when the buying picks up again."

(MilwaukeeRising editor's note: As the interview ended, Downs and reporter David Doege realized they both live in Story Hill, on the same block.)