Since Emily Rudow was eight years old, she’s hated the time-consuming process of putting on hockey gear, of which she is an avid player. And often, she would still find that she would get painful bruises on the back of her legs where her gear wasn’t protecting her.
So when she was in her fourth year at Wilfrid Laurier University studying in the school of business and economics, she developed the idea for Oneiric, a protective all-in-one base layer hockey pant specifically for children. After her idea received the most votes, she received a $1,000 grant from her professor that went to incorporating Oneiric as a company, and is now fully pursuing the idea.
Last week, she went on The Disruptors to talk about how her product will change the traditional sporting goods industry for hockey — though she noted that she wants to expand Oneiric to other high-contact sports.
“It’s an all-in-one piece of hockey equipment that essentially combines your pelvic protector, tape, kevlar socks, and jock-jill into one concise package that has additional safety and convenience features,” said Rudow. “The hockey equipment industry has been stagnant over the past few years with very little innovation, so we’re completely rethinking the way the hockey equipment industry works.”
Co-host Bruce Croxon expressed some skepticism toward the product, as his own kids play hockey and he said that they actually like the ritual of putting on hockey gear. “The only shot this company has in my humble opinion — and I’m glad to see that they have a patent pending — it’s all about distribution. They have to turn one of the big companies on in a hurry and get them to distribute and license it.”
Amber Kanwar said that people may get more excited once the company expands beyond hockey. “When I think about disruption in retailer clothing, it might get us more excited if you’re more broad. I think about Spanx and how disruptive they were,” she said.
Watch the whole pitch below:
Related: Oneiric is making hockey gear to keep kids safe
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