The E-Z Clip Sheetstraps (middle or corner) keeps the sheet fitted to any bed. Anyone can attach the E-Z- Clips in a matter of seconds. The E-Z Clip is designed for convenience,
reliability & easy installation
We also manufacture the Pillowhold for flexible beds (hospital beds) “It’s good for people in nursing homes,” he says. “A lot of elderly people have arthritis, so they would have a lot of trouble adjusting their pillow or keeping the sheet in place on their bed.” Order yours today at:
Rick Taylor can tell you all about necessity being the mother of invention.
A decade ago, when he was hospitalized after being shot in the face and throat, Taylor struggled to stay comfortable in his hospital bed – largely because the pillow would not stay in place.
“It was very frustrating,” the 50-year-old High Point, N.C. man recalls. “If I would reach over to the nightstand or anywhere else, there would go that pillow. Every time I raised the bed, there would go the pillow falling. You would just have to keep putting it back into place.”
Unaware of any sort of device he could get to keep his pillow from falling, Taylor invented his own mechanism – an adjustable strap that easily clips onto a hospital bed or chair and holds the pillow in place using the E-Z-Clips. That invention led to another one, the E-Z Clip Sheetstraps. Instead of those frustrating garter buckles. Just clip them on and they are guaranteed to hold your sheet on the mattress.
“He is so creative,” says Cindy Teer, an old family friend who opened her home to Taylor last summer when he was discouraged and looking to move back to High Point,N.C. from his home in Linville Falls, N.C.
Taylor, a former home-improvement contractor now on disability, says the patent on his product is a testament to what hard work and determination can accomplish, even in the face of adversity.
“People told me, ‘Oh, you’ll never get a patent,'” Taylor says. “I heard that a lot.”
But Taylor persisted, and on Dec. 23, he received the patent notification he had been seeking for the better part of a decade.
Taylor’s journey to receiving the patent began in July 1993, when he was living in Linville Falls,N.C. On a Saturday morning, a neighbor – reportedly upset that Taylor’s dogs had been keeping him awake at night – shot Taylor in the face and throat. Taylor was hospitalized and nearly died. (Today, he still uses a wheelchair because he loses his balance when he walks. He also has a speech impairment and wears an eye patch to prevent double vision that resulted from being shot.)
During his hospitalization, Taylor discovered how difficult it can be to keep a pillow in place behind his head on a raised hospital bed and keeping the sheet on the mattress on ANY bed. That’s how he hit on the idea of the Pillowhold, which is basically an elastic, adjustable strap that clips to the pillow and to the back rail of, say, a hospital bed using the E-Z Clips. When the bed is raised, the pillow moves with the patient as the bed is elevated or lowered, Taylor points out.
The E-Z Clip Pillowholds and E-Z Clip Sheetstraps are manufactured in High Point, N.C. and Taylor says he has sold more than 1,000 of them through his Web site, www.pillowhold.com. He has sold mostly to individuals, he says, but he hopes to sell them in bulk to hospitals and nursing homes, but all orders are welcome, no matter how big or small. He and Teer, who helps Taylor run his small business, have hired a company to help them market Taylor’s inventions.
The Pillowhold sells for $9.97, E-Z Clip Sheetstrap 9.97 and the Corner E-Z Clip Sheetholders 4/11.95 and can be ordered on Taylor’s Web site at:
Taylor says he tries to inspire others who are facing adversity.
“I’ve met people who were injured and were discouraged,” Taylor says, “and I told them, ‘Take what God has left you and do what you can with it, and He’ll help you.'”
To order the E-Z Clip Pillowholds or E-Z Clip (corner or middle) Sheetstraps, or for more information, visit www.pillowhold.com or call (888) 790-8070.
