Joy Mangano was 33 and divorced. She had three kids under age 7, and was hardly keeping up payments on her small two-bedroom home by working extra hours as a waitress. "There were times when I would lie in bed and think. I don't know how I'm going to pay that bill," Mangano says.
But she had a special ability for seeing the obvious thing. She knew how hard it was to mop the floor. "I was tired of bending down, putting my hands in dirty water, wringing (拧) out a mop," Mangano says. "So, there's gotta be a better way."
How about a "self-wringing" mop? She designed a special tool that you could twist in two directions at once, and still keep your hands clean and dry. She set out to sell it, first a few at flea markets.
Then Mangano met with the media. But would couch potatoes buy a mop? The experts on shopping TV were less than certain. They gave it a try, and it failed. Mangano was sure it would sell if they'd let her do the on-camera display. She said, "Get me on that stage, and I will sell this mop because it's a great item."
So QVC, a multinational corporation specializing in televised home shopping, took a chance on her. "I got onstage and the phones went crazy. We sold every mop in minutes."
Today she's president of Ingenious Designs, a multimillion-dollar company, and one of the stars of HSN, the Home Shopping Network. Talking about the household invention, Mangano says, "It is as natural for me as it is for a parent to talk about his/her child."
