From A to Zike

By Dick Hughes  

JUNE 17, 2011 11:23 a.m. (1)

Since childhood, Nathan Scolari has kept notebooks of drawings and specs of ideas to make new things and make old things better.

Multiple times, he would see “something similar to an idea I had and I would say, ‘well, that’s pretty cool.’”

But a couple of years ago, Scolari “saw something that really bothered me – a commercial for RipStik, a kind of skateboard that twists, and I had that in several of my invention books.

“I literally got out of my seat.  That was it. That was the last straw.  I started calling friends and associates and said I was going into the invention business.”

From that came lightning speed drive to bring “one of my scooters to market” – the Zike, a line of multi-speed leg-propelled scooters that combines fun out of doors with burning calories, strengthening muscles and improving posture, coordination and motor skills.

The first scooter models for market are being built in China, and an engineer and a machinist are there now to oversee production.  It is one of a dozen trips Scolari and Zike personnel have made to China in the past year.

The company has “a number of retailers interested in carrying the product” and building that network is a work in progress, Scolari said.

Right now, he said, a lot of preparation is going into “a very elaborate marketing plan, including Zike Across America with us promoting better health choices for kids, teaching about kids being active and taking the product to schools and YMCAs.”

The Zike works like a Stairmaster, forcing the user to be upright, back straight. Like a bike it can move at a pretty good clip, depending on the age-appropriate model.

Scolari originally envisioned 14 models and now has 18 in production or on the drawing board. Coming soon, he said, is “a model for folks that are more mature and want to exercise and get around.  We call it the Boomer.”

When the Zike marketing team unveiled models and gave demonstrations at the American International Toy Fair in New York in February, they received photo publicity from the Associated Press and Fox Business.

Scolari’s original intent to build scooters in America was thwarted by cost. “When we priced around, it was three times as much and that is even counting the freight to get it here. If it costs three times as much, then you have the mark-up for the retailers … (and) you are beyond the price parents are willing to pay for a scooter or bike.”

“It is hard to compete with China, but it is still our hope and our passion to create and then build in America,” he added.

His engineers and machinists spend a lot of time overseeing production in China to ensure a high-quality product.

Scolari’s biggest challenge is financing.

He put his own “substantial” savings into the business, stripped his landscaping business and lined up one investor for $300,000 and smaller ones from local business people, including doctors “who really get” the tie between fun and exercise.

When he wound down landscaping  to devote full time to Zike, he gave up his fall-back.  “If this business were to fail, I will have lost everything because I am too deeply into it.”

Scolari said banks “have not been a good source of funding whatsoever,” and venture capitalists extract too big a price in taking control of the company, replacing key personnel and potentially spinning it off after making “that quick dollar.”

In putting “it all on the line,” Scolari is not thinking small.  “Literally, I have over 100 things I want to take to market.  There’s a vast amount of intellectual property we’re working on, a vast amount of patents and other inventions.”

His ambition is that Zike and other products he plans will be household names known for “John Deere quality with Apple innovation.  We want it to be the Apple of bikes.”

Scolari, 44, grew up in Buffalo, N.Y., and came to Greenville in 1988 to attend Bob Jones University.  He hasn’t strayed far.  What was his landscape business is now the Zike offices across the road.