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It’s the end of an era.

Trevor walked upstairs last week holding the only 3 remaining Flat Cats and handed them over to Mitch.  There they were.  The last three. 

In case you didn’t know, Blue Q began it’s life with this “two-dimensional cardboard kitty that was marketed as the”Perfect Pet”. 

Let’s take a quick history tour here, shall we?

20 (give or take) years ago in Boston, Mitch spied this Cannon ad in a magazine.   

He thought it was pretty cool, ripped it out, glued it to some corragated cardboard and stuck it on his desk.  At that time he and his brother Seth had already rented a space to start some sort of lighting company.  Seth was working in high tech.  Mitch was manning the fort, coming up with ideas.  When people walked into the joint, they’d comment on this standup feline…how cool it was….someone thought it was real…..commented enough on it….Mitch brought the idea to Seth.  Seth said, Sure.

Mitch contacted Cannon.  Cannon contacted the photographer, Manny Denner, and Manny said, “Sure, I have outtakes.”  Mitch went down to New York to look at those outtakes, got mugged, and then picked out the perfect photo.

They sourced out a printer, a die cutter, priced out making 10,000.

Seth said – hey, if we’re gonna make 10,000, let’s just make sure there’s SOME interest.  SOMEwhere.

 

Mitch called out to Copley Fair (still a loyal and loving customer) to see if they would have any interest.  Sure.  They would.  I mean, they need to see the end result, but then sure.  They would.

They told Mitch about the New York Gift Show - maybe he’d want to show these cardboard cats there.  Mitch and Seth did.   They rented a booth at the show and filled it with cats.  Flat ones.  They didn’t know anything about Sales Reps – how to get the word out.  But they started collecting cards.  One Sales Rep said, “You know what?  I can get this thing into the window at Bloomingdales.”

And he did.

(Picture this Bloomingdale’s window filled with Flat Cats.  Because in 1988, it was.)

And hell, once you’re in the window of Bloomie’s, you’re pretty much starting a business here.

There’s so much more to the story – like how the Nash’s dad pretty much named the Flat Cat (saying, and I’m paraphrasing here) that the only good cats are flat ones – and how Seth quit his high tech job 3-4 weeks after the Bloomingdales Window thing – and then how the Instant Infant was the next cardboard wonder in line……

But for now, we say adieu.  Adieu, little kitty.  Adieu.

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