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Local mom keeps babies warm with new blanket
Amy Long holds one of her Secure2Me blankets. Submitted Photo
By Stefanie White, McKinney Courier-Gazette
Amy Long, of McKinney, didn’t set out to be an entrepreneur when she invented the Secure2Me blanket. She was just trying to find a way to keep her newborn son’s blanket from slipping off.
“I just had my third baby and ran out of hands,” Long said. “I struggled to keep him covered that first fall and winter.”
The mother of three said tucking the blanket into the car seat or stroller proved to be an ineffective way to keep the blanket in place.
Long, a registered nurse, said she played around with different methods to keep the blanket in place.
“I first tried these long safety pins,” Long said. “Then I tried these big alligator clips. Of course, safety pins put holes in my fabric. Plus, I didn’t think it was very safe to have metal near my baby.”
After securing a safe metal clip to the blanket and clipping the ends to her baby gear, the Secure2Me blanket was born.
“I completed my first blanket in November, and we took it to Costco and I was mobbed,” Long said. “People just loved them.”
Though the Secure2Me blanket was popular with fellow parents, Long said she was unsure about turning her invention into a business. It was her husband, Kevin, who encouraged his wife to patent the Secure2Me blanket.
“My husband was the one saying, ‘This could be huge,’” Long said. “Without him, I’d be satisfied to make one for me in every color and sell some to my girlfriends.”
Long said she and Kevin did a lot of research before deciding to go public with their business in December 2006.
“It’s something we thought about carefully before launching this company,” Long said.
The Secure2Me blankets have been more successful than Long said she expected.
“I didn’t set out to start a business,” Long said. “I just needed something for myself. We’ve been very pleasantly surprised by the response.”
Recently, Long was approached by Amazon.com to sell her blankets on its Web site. Blankets can be found at www.secure2me.com or in various stores throughout the south and southwest.
“It was a several month journey of fulfilling all the requirements for Amazon.com,” Long said.
Long said she will launch the Secure2Me grand, which is geared for adults and teenagers in wheelchairs, in November. The blanket, which is larger than the Secure2Me blanket, will clip on to clothing.
“My grandma would fall asleep in her recliner and her little blanket would fall off,” Long said. “Secure2Me is colorful, luxurious fabrics.”
Long said she has enjoyed having her own business and is pleased she can help out fellow parents like herself.
“I enjoy people and I enjoy marketing and I enjoy making things,” she said. “Once I saw it was a need I had, I thought it was a need other parents had.”
Contact staff writer Stefanie White at swhite@acnpapers.com. To post comments online, access this story at www.scntx.com.
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