In response to the business challenge and the heightened consumer awareness around spreading germs, his team quickly huddled and came up with a new product.
- Name: Steve Marzio
- Title: CEO
- Company: Case-Mate
- Region: Atlanta, Georgia
- Vistage Chair: Shaun Bradley
Steve Marzio is the CEO of Case-Mate, one of the leading brands of mobile phone accessories in the US, and also a Vistage Member.
Very quickly after the shutdown, he realized with their major customers' doors closing (such as T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon), he would need to find alternative ways to keep business going in order to keep all of their employees employed.
The Challenge: It is well documented in the news that our phones are filthy with germs and yet, most people rarely wipe them down. In fact, our smartphones and their cases are often carriers of more gems than a common toilet seat.
Leadership Opportunity: In response to the business challenge and the heightened consumer awareness around spreading germs, his team quickly huddled and came up with several ideas, one of which was to get into the Anti-Bacterial wipe business to start to promote the idea for consumers to keep their phones wiped down.
Within about an hour they had the name: CLEANSCREENZ. Upon a suggestion from a new salesperson, they quickly amended to CLEANSCREENZ by CASE-MATE.
Steve challenged their graphic designer to come up with a logo and when she asked when he needed it by, Steve half-jokingly said, "an hour from now would be great!"
Fast forward 2 weeks, Case-Mate now has a factory to produce the wipes and have pre-sold $200K worth of wipes before ever having a finished goods sample.
They're firmly entering the Anti-Bacterial Wipe segment that they would have never dreamed of being in 6 months ago or in any so-called "strategy session."
The lesson here? Ingenuity + Opportunity + Hustle + Free Market = Success
