Petzl is a 50-year-old French-American company that I'm guessing you've never heard of.
Started by a French caving enthusiast and mountaineering inventor named Fernand Petzl, the company might be the biggest climbing company in the world, but it's still about as mainstream as the north face of the Eiger. Petzl and its American subsidiary, Petzl America — with headquarters right here in our back yard in Clearfield — make such things as carabiners and climbing pulleys and belayers and rope grabs. Great stuff if you're at Everest base camp, but not exactly essential for existing in the suburbs.
But then this past winter somebody stayed up late one night at the office and came up with a bright idea — and I do mean a bright idea — and suddenly Petzl is popping up in everyday conversations not taking place on mountainside or inside caves.
The idea is called a Zipka, Petzl's name for what may well be the world's lightest and longest-lasting flashlight.
It is about half the size of a golf ball; it weighs 2.2 ounces — and that includes three AAA batteries — and when it's turned on, it will last for about 150 hours — or roughly an average person's flashlight lifetime.
Hang on to it, and you may never need another flashlight.
The Zipka is an outgrowth of the Tikka, a Petzl-designed headlamp invented three years ago and designed to fit on climbing helmets.
In Hindi, Tikka means "third eye."
Both the Tikka and the Zipka use LEDs — short for Light Emitting Diodes — to produce light. LED bulbs are especially long-lasting and have long been utilized by the auto industry — which is why the lights in your dashboard don't normally burn out no matter how long you own the car. LEDs are also standard equipment for traffic lights.
Why the LED concept hadn't been heretofore transferred over to everyday use — the main challenge involved turning LEDs into light that could help you see as opposed to light you could see — no one's quite sure. But nobody at Petzl is losing any sleep over why it was up to them to finally do it.
Because they're selling like hotcakes.
Or, as Petzl's Peter Popall said as he displayed a Zipka at Petzl's booth at the Outdoor Retailer Show under way this weekend at the Salt Palace, "I'd say really good hotcakes. More like fresh cookies."
Just this month, Men's Journal included the Zipka in its list of "Perfect Stuff You Must Own."
It's right there on the magazine's roster of 64 refined modern inventions, alongside something called a Big Agnes Sleeping Bag, a Charlton Fly Reel, TaylorMade 360 golf irons, a Victorinox Backpack-on-wheels, a Y2K Superbike, a Scarabeo Scooter, a B-52 softball bat, Dragonfly Folding Sunglasses and a few dozen other things civilized man is not supposed to be able to live without.
Essentials sure aren't what they used to be.
In its own quiet way, the Zipka is just another example of one scientific discovery begetting another. LEDs weren't uncovered until scientists discovered the existence of the center of the atom, and they weren't used as bulbs in mountaineering headlamps until climbers created a demand for them.
Now, they're coming to a convenience store near you — or at least a Brookstone.
"You'll never be in the dark again," says Popall.
And Petzl will never again be just a climbing company.
Lee Benson's column runs Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Please send e-mail to benson@desnews.com and faxes to 801-237-2527.