Teenage entrepreneur Jordan Daykin is travelling to the USA in a bid to take his invention – the GripIt Fixing – global.
The 19-year-old, who last year secured £80,000 of funding from Dragons’ Den star Deborah Meaden, flies to America at the end of the month for a series of meetings with buyers from several big brands in the US market.
Jordan said, “When I started this business with my granddad Stan, I imagined I would build it up and perhaps sell it on. However, thanks to Deborah’s guidance, my vision has changed. Now I can see that – with the help of a great team – I can do this myself and take GripIt Fixings to an international level.”
GripIT Fixings first came into being in 2009 due to a chance discovery by Jordan and Stan, now 81. Jordan was 13 at the time. Jordan was moving into a converted garage at his grandparents’ home and wanted a blind for his new bedroom window.
Using products already on the market, the pair found they could not safely secure anything heavy to the modern structure. The drill bits hit a steel lintel causing them to break, and the fixings available on the market were unable to work effectively as the gap between the plasterboard and the steel was too narrow.
Stan, who was an engineer for his working life, started to play around with some designs with Jordan and they came up with a unique answer – the GripIt fixing.
This fixing uses a ‘wing’ feature which spreads out, thus spreading the load and allowing modern walls to bear the weight of objects more effectively. In other words it’s a revolutionary plasterboard fixing, the strongest on the market, reusable and universal.
GripIt Fixings is based in Commerce Way, Melksham.
