Chiggs Baby Wheels
Thank you to Elizabeth Geldart of Chiggs for sending us this guest blog piece……
Sharon
“My business, Chiggs Ltd, (www.chiggs.co.uk ) wholesales my own inventions- the Baby Feed Wheel, Baby Medicine Wheel and the Get Well Wheel. These are parenting products, cards and gifts with a numbered dial to keep track of baby’s feed and everyone’s medicine times!
The inspiration for my first invention, the Baby Feed Wheel, came in October 2005 when I was visiting a friend who’d just had a baby. In the midst of sleep deprivation, she couldn’t remember her little boy’s last feed time, so I jokingly suggested she used a car parking disc to set the time whenever he had a feed. A couple of days later I took round a little ‘homemade’ version (covered in blue paper with a little picture stuck on the front!)
Remembering my own ‘hazy days’ after my daughter Holly’s birth, when I would write feed times down on pieces of paper, I realised what a useful idea this would be for new parents.
After two months of design, research and sourcing suppliers I secured a design patent, commissioned the first print run of Baby Feed Wheels, and launched the website, www.chiggs.co.uk
I had designed the Baby Feed Wheel in blue, pink and lemon with “to” and “from” printed on the reverse; so as well as being a thoroughly useful product for parents, it could also be sent as a congratulations card or ‘new baby’ gift, just as I had made for my friend.
The Baby Medicine Wheel followed soon after. Whilst on holiday with friends and their little boy, he was teething and needed medicine. Our friends used a Baby Feed Wheel to record the time of each dose so that they knew when the next dose would be due. Shortly after the holiday I contacted the Patent Office with my second product!
The Get Well Wheel completes the Chiggs range, (which are all printed in the UK and hand finished in Harrogate). With ‘time of last medicine’ printed on the front, older children and adults of all ages can monitor their medicine times whether recovering from illness, or taking regular medication.
I’ve found developing my own inventions into a business incredibly rewarding. It’s a long way from my previous career as an Air Stewardess, and has been an incredible learning curve! I’ve had great support from my husband Andrew, and my daughter Holly, now 6, is an important part of the business. She’s handed leaflets out at trade fairs, licked stamps, stuck stickers and if she had her way she would be allowed to answer the ‘phone, too!
