What if you couldn’t hear a fire alarm?
For the deaf and hard-of-hearing community, being unable to hear a fire alarm could potentially be the difference between life and death. Covington-based entrepreneur Trevon Bruch has wrestled with this question since a fire alarm woke him one fateful night in 2018.
“I was asleep and awoken by a fire alarm and basically thought, ‘What if I didn’t hear that and what if something was wrong,'” Bruch told LINK nky.
Bruch’s startup, Safewave Technologies, offers a solution to that question through wearable technology. On Monday, Safewave officially launched the first generation of its smartwatch band tailored for the deaf and hard-of-hearing community.
In the United States today, approximately 3.6% of the country’s population, about 11 million individuals, consider themselves to be deaf or have serious difficulty hearing, according to the National Deaf Center for Postsecondary Outcomes.
However, Bruch’s ambitions for Safewave stretch beyond just positively affecting the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. Eventually, he hopes to take Safewave worldwide, impacting everyone from small children to people with neurodegenerative conditions.
“We’re looking to help people with dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, special needs and small children,” Bruch said.
So, how does the technology work? The watchband has a Bluetooth sensor that connects with nearby security devices such as smoke detectors, fire alarms and Ring doorbells. The watchband connects to these systems through Safewave phone app. The watchband alerts the wearer with a strong vibration once an alarm that’s connected to the sensor goes off.
Safewave co-founder Jared Gabbard said the launch was nearly five years in the making. The startup soft-launched a prototype in April 2023. Since then, Safewave has revamped the watchband’s design and added features like a visible power button.
“We’re ready to start selling,” Gabbard said. “We’re finally going to bring in money instead of just burning it. I feel like it’s very anticipated within that community. We’re definitely looking to be able to help and bring a product to the table that’s specifically for them.”
The Safewave watchband retails for $250 and is available exclusively on the company’s website. The app is free to download on iOS. At launch, Safewave had 1,000 units in stock. Bruch said he hopes to sell $250,000 worth of watchbands within three to six months.
To drum up support for the launch, Safewave has utilized influencer marketing. The startup collaborated with Matt Maxey, an Atlanta-based content creator and entrepreneur, to create custom social media commercials. Maxey is a prominent voice within the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. His Instagram alone boasts nearly 100,000 followers.
His organization, DEAFinitely Dope, uses American Sign Language to interpret music for deaf and hard-of-hearing fans during live music events. Maxey has worked with large touring artists such as Waka Flocka Flame and Chance the Rapper.
Bruch called influencer marketing an “organic” way to grow Safewave’s brand. The collaboration has proved successful, as working with Maxey and other influencers allowed Safewave to reach a large audience while keeping marketing costs low.
“Our reach just continues to go up,” Bruch said. “It’s just up to us on our side to make sure that we’re producing good tech.”
Besides influencer marketing, Safewave is focused on growing through word-of-mouth within the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. From Bruch’s perspective, having satisfied customers recommend the product will not only market the product but also give the company credibility.
“I think the product’s really going to grow when we grow within the community and they start talking about it,” he said. “Word of mouth is going to be the biggest spread of what we’re building.”
Looking forward, Bruch said Safewave plans to unveil four versions of its watchband. The startup has already secured a lease on an office in Covington’s Central Business District. The office overlooks the intersection of Madison Avenue and W. Pike Street. A neon sign adorned with the company’s Safewave wordmark can be seen from the street level in the window of their second-story office.
Right now, Bruch and Gabbard are Safewave’s only full-time employees. Bruch said he hopes to grow the team throughout the remainder of the year.
“This is just the start,” he said.
