When Wallingford-based Z-Medica Corp. launched QuikClot in 2002, the product was meant to save lives on the battlefield.
Now, thanks to the encouragement of a sporting goods giant, it may save the lives of hunters and other outdoor enthusiasts.
QuikClot is a made of an inert mineral material that almost instantly stops high-volume bleeding from open wounds outside an operating room setting.
Z-Medica had not intended to develop a consumer-type version of QuikClot. The product was designed specifically for the military and first responders, available only in a granulated version that was not appropriate for consumer use.
“But we had one sporting goods store that kept calling us and asking about carrying the product,” said Z-Medica CEO Raymond Huey.
And that store was Cabela’s, the massive sporting goods store that just made its initial foray into Connecticut with its East Hartford store.
QuikClot had gotten the attention of John O’Rourke, Cabela’s product manager for camping and outdoor gear, who wished the clotting product had been available when a friend had been involved in a hunting accident several years earlier.
Hunting Accident Sparks Query
While on an elk hunt with some friends, “a buddy got [shot with] a buck shot into his thigh, just missing an artery, and we were two and a half miles in. He didn’t bleed to death or anything. He was fine, but I started to research what we could have done.”
At the time, there was little available on the market for hunters when such an emergency occurred. So O’Rourke continued to look for such a product, and about 2 years ago, discovered QuikClot was being used for the military. He personally contacted Z-Medica officials and urged them to develop a consumer version of the product.
Although it had never been the company’s goal to market the product to consumers when Huey joined the company in 2004, the encouragement from Cabela’s prompted Z-Medica to switch gears. The company fast tracked its research of QuikClot Sport and QuikClot Sport Silver over 18 months, with key developments allowing the interspersing of the clotting agent into sponges that can be packed into a wound.
A New Vision
While QuikClot’s two new products — priced between $9.99 and $29.99 on Cabela’s Web site — are being marketed towards sports and adventure enthusiasts, its foray into the consumer market has peaked Z-Medica’s interest in developing the product for use in other sectors, Huey said.
“There’s been a real good push from the industrial and health sectors to use our product,” he explained. “There are also some surgical applications that we’re trying to develop and hopefully will launch in 2009.”
While the military provided a boon for the company with almost 1 million QuikClot products purchased since it began offering it in 2002, Huey said the company is looking to reduce its dependence on military sales.
“We have a business plan for the surgical products and we have a business plan for the consumer side,” he said. “The military is always going to be there and we have always supported the troops. But we would like to reduce the percentage of total sales that come from the military.”
QuikClot Sport will be available in 27 sporting goods chains nationwide this fall, said Ted Russell, Z-Medica’s vice president of sales. In addition to striking a deal with Cabela’s, the company also has deals with Adventure 16 and Peregrine Outfitters that also serve as distributors to stores like Dick’s Sporting Goods and Bass Pro Shops.
Z-Medica currently has 20 employees, up from five just three years ago.
