Looslis in the News

Last week both Jared and Ashton were featured in newspaper stories - Jared for winning this big "Concept to Company" contest for seed capital for innovative technological ideas (70 ideas were entered and Jared and his partner Bill were the winners) and Ashton for the film he made (starring his pet snake) for the PTA Reflections Art Contest that won at the district level and is going on to be judged at a regional level. I'm so proud of these amazing men in my life!

Here's a link to the best of two newspaper articles written about Jared's big win:
http://www.thespectrum.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200990119001

And here's a link to the article with Ashton in it:
http://www.thespectrum.com/article/20090116/ST%20GEORGE/901160314

I had the privilege of going to Jared's presentation before the judges a couple weeks ago - he was one of 8 finalists that each did a 30 minute presentation on their concept. Jared and his partner Bill Gordon have been working on an exciting new product that uses the refrigeration unit on truck trailers to cool the truck cabs so that truck drivers no longer have to idle their trucks in order to have air conditioning as they sleep in their trucks at night. This invention would save LOTS of money on gas and be great for the environment as well. Since saving money and saving the environment are hot topics these days, the time seems perfect to get this "CoolCab" contraption on the market.

Jared did a truly wonderful job with his presentation - he was so comfortable in front of the judges and explained everything so well with the help of very professional and targeted visuals via his powerpoint presentation. He handled the judges questions like a pro and every judge was nodding along and looking totally engrossed. I sat there feeling so very proud of my amazingly smart, handsome, capable and savy husband!

After that finalist presentation, Jared's product was selected as one of the top 3 and then on the twins' birthday, I went to see him do one last presentation for the general public as part of the Southern Utah Economic Summit Conference and at the close of that meeting, he and Bill were awarded first prize. Yeah! This means they get $10,000 in cash and $10,000 in services to move their idea forward - plus they have lots of new connections and potential new investors thanks to the publicity. Good stuff!

Then the next day, Jared had two of his trucks get in major wrecks which is not a great thing for an already struggling trucking company. But as always, he handled that big mess with calm finesse and things will hopefully be OK. We're hoping to get this new product really going and that will make a big difference for Jared's trucking company and hopefully many others as well!