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Will Starcher likes to paint at a 45-degree angle. Trouble was, he couldn’t find an easel that would allow him to set up a canvas that way.

So eight years ago, he invented one, and over the years, he’s improved it.




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He calls it the Spider Easel, and not only can it hold canvasses at an angle, but it can also hold anything as small as a postcard or as large as an 8-foot-by-8-foot canvas. Unlike most easels, it’s one-size-fits-all, it’s light-weight and it can be packed up and carried around.A senior in Marshall University’s fine arts program, Starcher showed it around to some other artists he knew, wondering if they’d ever be interested in buying one. And they said they would.Now Starcher and his sister, Margie Starcher, a working accountant and a business student at West Virginia University at Parkersburg, are getting a new company under way — Arachnovation. He’s the artistic/marketing side of the biz, and she’s the finance/management side, and their product and business plan are so impressive they won WVU’s first statewide Business Plan Competition.The competition was divided into two categories: “High Tech,” which encompasses new innovations and improvements in technology, and “Lifestyles,” which encompasses anything else.The Spider Easel — which Margie Starcher described as the “Swiss army knife of easels” — fell under “High Tech,” and as the winners, the Starchers receive resources for the start-up of their company, including legal services from Spilman, Thomas and Battle, PLLC; accounting services from Dixon Hughes, PLLC; physical or virtual office space at the WVU Business Incubator and business cards and letterhead from Signs Plus. “We wanted to enter about two years ago, but it wasn’t open to the entire state,” Will Starcher said. But some college representatives from around the state — including Liz Murray and Amy Anastasia at Marshall — urged WVU to open it up to students at all state colleges. Murray teaches a technology innovation class, from which other entries came for the competition, and Anastasia is assistant director of the Technology Transfer Office, helping students and faculty at Marshall get patents on their discoveries and inventions, and get new businesses off the ground.“We have a lot of creative students at Marshall,” Anastasia said. “Margie and Will — they make a great team.”Winning the competition was particularly exciting because they’d been working on the prototype and the business plan for several years, the brother-sister team said.“I’ve done whatever Will needed to help him with this,” Margie Starcher said. “We went to a trade show in Chicago, and we received a lot of good feeback that showed there was a market for it at the time.”At this point, they plan to get out there and make sure a lot of artists see if first-hand.“Artists like to see and touch things,” Margie Starcher said. “We’re going to put it in the artists’ hands and let them see and touch this. We’ll send Will to workshops.”They have orders for some already but still need to get them produced. The Starchers expect to have a limited run available for sale by the end of 2007.And there’s more coming.“(The Spider Easel is) our flagship product, and I have five more in the wings,” Will Starcher said. “In a year or two, I should be rolling those products onto the market.”It’s great to see their dreams come true, his sister said.And when it comes to having the vision to make it happen, the Starchers really didn’t need much help, said Tom Pressman of Strictly Business in Huntington, who coached them as they prepared for the competition.“They didn’t need much help — they’re both so bright and enthusiastic,” Pressman said. “(The Spider Easel) is outstanding. It came out of a real need. Will’s an artist, and through his need, he developed a product, and it’s going to be a great addition to the art world.”Their winning the competition this year was amazing, Anastasia said. “When they got that check and it said ‘Arachnovation’ on there, I cried like a proud parent,” she said. “Being able to work with people so innovative and creative, it’s inspiring.”