(Story by: Ian Campbell, WEtech Intern) A local entrepreneur hopes to take a niche market by storm after locally developing and manufacturing a product that he thinks can help many.
Tim Fittler of Fittler Sales & Marketing is an entrepreneur originally from Kingsville, Ontario came up with a glow in the dark toilet seat called Potty Glow and in the early 2000’s was able to sell over 50,000 units at early stage business.
Potty Glow could quickly lose its glow however and the item was seen mainly as a novelty. Despite this, Fittler saw a practical use for a glow in the dark toilet seat and was able to work with local students and instructors at St. Clair College as well as a local manufacturer to create Night Glow.
Night Glow is a glow in the dark toilet seat that has been designed and developed to help people find their way to the bathroom, whether it be in a dark hotel, a long term care facility, a hospital or residential use.
“Our core markets are definitely going to be home improvement stores like Rona, Lowes, Home Hardware and Home Depot,” said Fittler. “Secondly where we think it has a better application is hotels, hospitals and seniors homes… it will be a valuable glow in the dark toilet seat.”
Scott O’Neil, Director of Applied Research and Development at St. Clair, worked closely with Fittler on the development of Night Glow. Their objective was to find a glow resin that could both glow the best and last the longest. Currently the glow resins being used are blue and green. They also looked at a variety of seat shapes for different preferences.
“Years ago with the first product Potty Glow, it was very novelty-kitschy, but the glow resin itself only lasted and hour and a half,” said Fittler. “Night Glow will last 10 hours, so if you get up in the middle of the night or around 3, 4 or 5 in the morning, it’s still glowing.”

Fittler partnered up with the Colleges Ontario Network for Industry Innovation (CONII) on the Night Glow project. CONII provides funding to entrepreneurs as well as a team of students and instructors to aide in research, design, development and marketing of the products.
St. Clair College marketing students Amanda Cousins, Kyle Little, Brian Green, Emily Girard, James Dotzert and Blair Smith all worked on the project after being recruited by marketing instructor Stephen Janisse through CONII. The students were selected based on their dedication and passion for the project and each received bursaries after being chosen.
“The students put together a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis, creative techniques and strategies for the product, some really neat stuff,” said Janisse.”It’s been kind of up in the air until we got this new product and the students are very excited about these new seats.”
“It’s very eye opening especially with the whole who blames who when it comes to issues with the product,” said Emily Girard, speaking about the behind the scenes aspect of product development. “It’s interesting to see how that side of the business works, and it’s good to know how people deal with it.”
Not only does the Night Glow have its planning and development roots in Windsor, it is also manufactured in Windsor. Centoco Plastics, a local toilet seat manufacturer, is the last toilet seat manufacturer in Canada.
“The best thing about working with Centoco here in Windsor is that we can produce as much or as little as we need” said Fittler. “I know the importance of local manufacturing…partnering up with Centoco and the students here at St. Clair has just been a terrific synergy for everyone.”
Fittler plans to continue using Centoco as well as making Windsor a shipping hub for the product once it is launched.
Night Glow is set to launch in April 2013 and can be purchased online to start and hopes are that Night Glow will be made available in home improvement stores as well. For more information about Night Glow, visit www.Nightglowseats.com
Another glowing example of locally grown entrepreneurs creating jobs!