April 7, 2013
Joseph Deetz: CEO, Visual Magnetics, Mendon
Matt Volpini
What if a brick-and-mortar retailer could redesign its space like an online shopping website could?
That's the idea Joseph Deetz has been developing for years. Visual Magnetics, the company Deetz and his wife, Sandra, founded in 2007, is quickly gaining traction among major retailers.
Visual Magnetics has patented a latex wall primer that contains magnetic material, allowing for thinner, lighter and easily interchangeable retail store displays on top of it.
Visual's client list includes big names like Staples, Adidas, Nike and AT&T, among others.
The interior of Visual's headquarters is like playing with a room-sized Mr. Potato Head. It seems nearly everything adorning the walls — from a large and flexible whiteboard to wooden fixtures, photographs and wallpaper – are attached magnetically and can be moved or removed in seconds. It's hard to find a nail or screw.
"It's a totally flexible environment," Deetz said.
Several videos of the product's capabilities are available at Visualmagnetics.com.
The IP
Deetz has worked in the interiors and design industry for years. (He's also a talented banjo player.) In the mid-1990s, the restaurant chain Fuddruckers asked him to develop a customer magnetic menu board. It was during that process when Deetz came up with the idea that would launch Visual Magnetics about a decade later.
He realized that putting an iron product in a wall primer would allow wall coverings to be much lighter than traditional magnetic displays and provide a more versatile, rollable and durable option compared to foam board displays.
"It's a one-time application (of primer), then you're able to print on this media that doesn't stick to printers. You can print 60 inches wide and it's six times lighter, so it ships a lot cheaper and you can print a wide variety of print mediums," Deetz said.
He set to work refining the product over the next few years.
"It's all been kitchen chemistry," he said.
But even when he had developed and applied for patents on a non-toxic product that he thought worked well, the industry wasn't quite ready for it. That would change several years later as commercial flatbed printers got cheaper.
"That created a market for more changeable and disposable signage," Deetz said.
A Strong Start
Visual doubled its revenue for its first four years. The company now has offices or distribution sites in New York City, Europe, Latin America and Asia. It sells its primer product through five major North American distributors, who in turn sell to printers who create the retail advertising media.
Deetz is quick to give credit to his wife as being central to the company's continued success.
"It was Sandy and myself just pushing together to make this thing work," he said. "No funds or anything, just the seat of our pants."
Sandra Deetz, in turn, is quick to deflect the credit.
"He's really the brains behind the whole thing," she said.
The couple's daughter Tori handles some of their New York City operations, where the company is making a push toward the architecture and design market through an installation of its products for use by design students at the School of Visual Arts, which is located in Manhattan.
With a strengthening foothold in the retail world, the architecture and design market is Visual's next target, Joe Deetz said.
"We have 100 really great products we could launch tomorrow, but we'd rather develop each one smart and slow and do it right."
Video
Joseph Deetz, Visual Magnetics
WBJ Web Partners
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