I would say that the work for this cooler started in 2019, when I put pen to paper and drew the first design idea, but I’d be lying. It’s true that after a long float with friends, we started discussing improvements for the current cooler designs. I found myself questioning why there wasn’t something better out there.
So why would I be lying if I said that the design process for our cooler started four years ago? A simple answer is that I have been floating the river with my family for over 20 years. The experiences and situations I have encountered have helped to create, in my mind, what I know and believe to be the best floating cooler on the planet! I have experienced everything from popped cooler tubes to runaway soda jailbreaks! Every negative experience I had influenced my thoughts and ideas when designing away all of the known issues (and even some we had never thought of before).
I finally sat down and drew the first design, I knew immediately it wasn’t good enough. I wanted a cooler that would be difficult to tip over, but not a problem if it happened. I wanted a cooler that could keep my ice frozen and my drinks cold the entire float but didn’t need its own inflatable to tag along on our journey. I wanted to be able to look inside while floating on my back and see which drinks or snacks I was grabbing. I also thought allowing a way for customers to customize their coolers would be, well, way “cooler” 😎 (while also providing some additional utility). Thus the Muddiez coolers brand was born out of necessity.
CAD designs started in 2020 and continued through to the beginning of 2023. With COVID we had a tough time finding the right person to help bring our vision to life, but after some time we found our lead engineer, Hunter Arvin, co-founder of Design Prototype Consult LLC. We enjoyed working with each other so much that we invited him to join us on our journey launching this product!
In April 2023, our first working prototype was built with 3D printing. We thought that it was too heavy, even without it being filled. We also didn’t like how much weight was being put on the top hull so we made modifications and ended up with our second working prototype in May 2023. After some more testing, we liked that this prototype distributed the weight from the rope to the bottom of the hull. Although this version weighed much less and was easier to handle, we realized it was far TOO small for our drink needs.
Our last prototype was created in August 2023. We increased the size just enough to allow for twicethe can capacity and keep a manageable weight. After realizing that our latch was not as easy as we had expected to open with our new and improved seal, we went back to the drawing board. Just in the nick of time we came up with a fantastic solution. Our engineer met us in Concan Texas with our new lid and latch to test out before we shot video for our kickstarter campaign. The new latch was a massive success and the rest is history!
The Kickstarter Phase
We launched our kickstarter in November 2023. After we reached our goal, we started creating the three molds needed to rotomold our cooler hull parts as well as getting everything else needed for our coolers and products.
We unfortunately ran into many issues with our molding process however, with a new, closer rotomold partner at the end of 2024, we started producing production models.
The Production Phase
Our current manufacturing partner is Centex, located in Bryan, TX where our three roto-molded parts are created and foamed.
From there, our cooler hull parts are sent to our facility in Franklin, TX for cooler hull glueing and assembly.
Once the hull is assembled, the coolers are sent to our College Station, TX facility for final assembly including adding the latch, rope, handles, tube top customization and all other Muddiez products and accessories.
