He was an 8th grade drop-out and self-confessed weirdo

But that didn’t stop him from becoming a self-made millionaire

Ask Lorenzo what he was like as a child, and he’ll tell you, “I was a weird kid.”

He never even graduated from high school. In fact Lorenzo dropped out of school entirely by the time he reached the 8th grade.

Instead of wasting time in school, he wanted to live the life of a surfer dude. So when he was old enough, Lorenzo Maggiore moved to Oxnard California.

That’s a hot spot for surfers. It’s actually known as Surfer’s Paradise because the weather is perfect year round, and it has several different beaches for surfing.

One of those beaches, Silver Strand produces swells that rival those seen at the Banzai Pipeline in Hawaii.

But living a surfer’s life is often feast or famine. After three years in of more famine than feast, and with the encouragement of his very concerned parents, Lorenzo enrolled in a trade school.

That’s where he learned to hang wallpaper.

Oddly, he liked it. For him, hanging wallpaper was like putting together a puzzle. That’s because wallpapers that have a pattern need to be aligned just perfectly.

Now hooked on wallpaper, Lorenzo formed his own wallpaper hanging company. And it didn’t take him long to get clients. We’re talking wealthy clients too … like Beverly Hills socialites and celebrities.

Truth is, he got more than enough clients to pay the bills and then some. Being his own boss, meant he could make his own schedule.

That also meant he could squeeze in free time for -- you guessed it more surfing.

The Killer Artist Inside Him

Ten years later, Lorenzo was still hanging wallpaper and surfing.

But you can’t hang wallpaper and surf your entire adult life.

That’s why Lorenzo’s sister didn’t just suggest but signed him up for art classes.

And he loved it. It was a chance to unleash his creativity. He even opened his own studio in Santa Monica, where he quickly grew a following. People seemed to like his unusual paintings, which were kind of like “Picasso meets van Gogh.”

Now don’t get me wrong. Being an artist didn’t mean he was giving up surfing. No matter what, he still found time for riding the waves because he absolutely loved it.

But you know what he didn’t love?

Musca domestica.

The pesky housefly.

Otherwise known as the housefly.

Lorenzo has been hating on houseflies since he was nine years old. And he would do all sorts of things to kill them.

Like that time when he would catch a fly, put it inside his Hot Wheel car, then send the miniature vehicle flying down the track.

When the car crashed, the trapped fly was automatically doomed to death. Or the many times he would shoot rubber bands at the flies that landed on windows of his parents’ house.

Of his fly hating obsession, Lorenzo explains, “They land on poo. Then they land on you. Or on your food. Anything that does that, I’m not really interested in.”

Lorenzo doesn’t just dislike flies … he hates bugs in general. And he was determined to find a way to exterminate them from his life.

There’s Salt in That Water

Lurking in the back of his mind, Lorenzo had an idea to make a gun that kills flies.

As a teenager, he put some sand in the barrel of his BB gun and shot it at the flies. But it didn’t work all that well. Sometimes it hit the mark, other times not so much because the sand was too heavy.

And it left a mess around the house. After that, he never really thought about the idea.

But it resurfaced again in the 1990’s. This time though Lorenzo knew he needed something lighter than sand.

Something that wouldn’t make a mess … something that still hit the target … something that could stun the fly … something like …

Salt.

All those years of surfing in salty water … and finally he found the solution to his problem.

Lorenzo went about building a prototype of his salt killing fly gun. However something wasn’t quite right as the gun kept misfiring. He figured it was a bust. And he never thought about again.

Not until 2008 when his sister passed away. She had always been his biggest fan and supporter. It’s then he decided that life is too short not to pursue your dreams.

A few years later, through a series of emails, Lorenzo found a toy maker located in China who was willing to work on his fly gun.

So off to China he went.

Lorenzo spent months working with the designers and engineers to develop the toy gun. Finally a working prototype was complete.

The Bug-A-Salt Fly Gun

Money Well Spent

This was no cheap endeavor for Mr. Maggiore.

Lorenzo maxed out all his credit cards. He wound up putting out $70,000 of profits from his wallpaper hanging business, along with another $30,000 from an angel investor he met through a friend of the family.

A patent attorney alone cost him $50,000. And then he needed another $15,000 for the first round of production of the gun.

Looking back Lorenzo says, “I’m just sitting in the hotel looking at this thing I’ve just done. It’s ready for production but I have nowhere to sell it. I have no plan.”

In July of 2012 a friend suggested he make a video for Kickstarter to raise the money needed, which he didn’t hesitate to do.

In the video he demonstrated how the gun works, even added some slow-motion effects of what happens when the salt hits the fly.

But to his surprise, they rejected the video. Maybe because they thought the whole thing was a joke.

After all, we’re talking about a toy gun that uses salt to shoot flies. Yep, sounds totally legitimate.

However Lorenzo wasn’t about to give up, especially not after he had invested so much time and money.

So he tried another crowdfunding platform. They agreed to put up his video, with a “let’s just see how it goes” attitude.

Be Careful What You Wish For

Well, it went like magic.

In fact the folks over at BuzzFeed starting writing about his video. That’s a big deal because their website gets over 103 million visitors a month.

It’s no wonder his video received over 3.7 million views.

Orders came pouring in. By the end of September, Lorenzo had generated over $575,000. That was more than enough to start manufacturing his gun.

Except now he had a little problem.

See in the video he offered free shipping to anyone who bought his $30 fly gun. What he didn’t factor in was the number of customers who lived in foreign countries. Shipping the gun for free to those folks would eat up all his profits.

So he had no choice but to return their money. And of course, he stopped offering free shipping.

It’s a business lesson hard-earned. But those kinds of mistakes can happen when you’re a newbie entrepreneur.

Luckily it was one that didn’t put him out of business. In fact, orders kept rolling in.

By 2018, Bug-a-Salt guns were generating $28 million dollars in revenues.

More Flies Please

Lorenzo says that when people first purchase the gun, they’re skeptical it will work. In fact many think it’s more of a joke or novelty toy.

But once they start shooting, they get addicted. Some customers have told him they leave the doors and windows open on purpose so they can shoot more flies.

The Bug-a-Salt works not only on pesky flies, but you can use it on mosquitos, even roaches.

So far, Lorenzo has sold over 4 million guns. And where this is a gun, there is salt. You can use ordinary table salt, or you can buy the special edition Bug-A-Salt High Performance Salt.

Heck, you might even want a laser adapter kit, a holster, a gun rack, a hat … even your own set of Bug-A-Salt garden gnomes.

One fly expert says Lorenzo may have created the ultimate fly swatter. A fly can easily evade traditional fly swatters because they can detect swoosh coming milliseconds before the splat.

But not with the Bug-A-Salt. Now you too can become a fly snipper without ever leaving your house.

Lorenzo’s story shows that even the oddest of ideas can give birth to an entire line of products that people will buy on the fly.

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Awesome Quotes by Awesome People

“So you’re a little weird. Work it. A little different. Own it. Better to be a nerd than one of the herd.” – Mandy Hale

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