Randy Flowers and the Squarz-It.

• Author: Hill, Robin Mackey
• Position: Entrepreneurs

Randy Flowers can't begin to add up the time he's spent during the past 20 years rummaging around a construction site looking for a metal square. Although he's worked on Anchorage building sites since he was 13, Flowers still has trouble cutting a straight line without first measuring the length of the cut and then drawing a guideline on the board. Though necessary, squaring up a cut can be time-consuming, especially if you can't remember where you laid your square.

And then the idea came to him. While working on a construction site 10 years ago -- and hunting for his metal square -- Flowers began mentally designing a device that could screw onto the bottom of most circular saws, allowing a perfect cut every time, without having to draw a guideline.

After laying down his saw for the day, Flowers picked up a pencil and began sketching out his idea. When he was finished a couple of days later, he had the initial design for "Squarz-It," a flat, 18-ounce die-cast piece of aluminum with stainless steel springs that, in a matter of minutes, can be screwed to the base of most circular saws.

Once in place, the Squarz-It allows the user to make accurate, 90-degree cuts, without a guideline, on materials ranging in size from 1 inch x 2 inches to 2 inches x 6 inches. When the device isn't needed, its metal fence folds into place, eliminating the need to remove the Squarz-It when using the saw for other types of cuts.

"You make a perfect cut every time," says Flowers. "It's a time savings that's almost incalculable."

Flowers, a born tinkerer with a notebook full of would-be inventions, made a few minor revisions to his original drawing, had an $800 prototype made, and in 1989, 18 months after submitting his idea for consideration, received U.S. patent No. 4,777,726. "This thing went through without one red mark," says Flowers. "It just came back with a patent."

Since then, Flowers has scrambled to teach himself everything he can about manufacturing and marketing. One of the first lessons he learned was that producing the device in Alaska would be impossible. "We don't have the machinery up here to turn out the type of mill work we need," he says.

Tom Burgess, a program manager with the University of Alaska Small Business Development Center, agrees. Burgess is familiar with the Squarz-It and has been helping Flowers market it to the military and other federal agencies.

As a result, Flowers and financial partner and fellow builder Ted Jackson arranged...