Breaking into distribution business

A bad break can turn into a business. Literally.

Lynn Moloney learned that two years ago, after her 11-year-old son broke his ankle while in his backyard in Farmingdale.

Moloney, 52, is now the sole distributor in the United States, Canada and Mexico, of the AlbacMat, basically a stretcher designed to slide over concrete or carpet, allowing emergency personnel to quickly evacuate an injured or frail person. The AlbacMat, designed by an Australian woman, Allison Backhouse, includes a polypropylene board and is made of lightweight canvas material.

Two weeks after her son's accident, there was a fire drill at his school. Unable to walk, he was told to remain "in an area of refuge," near a window, where he could be rescued, his mother said.

"That alarmed me," she said. "I couldn't believe we would leave anybody behind in an emergency. It's the herd mentality, leaving the wounded behind. It's unacceptable."

She found the AlbacMat on the Internet and contacted Backhouse.

"We began a pen-pal relationship," Moloney said.

She took her first shipment in December 2010. Since then, Moloney has sold about 1,000 mats, which cost $389 each, to school districts, hospitals and facilities for handicapped people. In an email, Backhouse said 15,000 mats have been sold worldwide since 2003.

Moloney has formed a company, Advanced Egress Solutions Inc., in Bethpage. The mother of five is the company's president.

"Kudos to the mom who felt there was a need to promote this issue and to be entrepreneurial enough" to start the business, said Ken Willette, a manager with the Quincy, Mass.-based National Fire Protection Association.

There is a more rugged device known as the Sked rescue system, designed years ago by an Oregon company and used by the military.

Moloney has put all the money she's earned back into the business. "I started this on a shoestring, with good friends helping me. I had zero business experience," she said.