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<–That’s Cooper. The brains behind Cooper Picks.
Cooper Picks were developed innocently enough. I needed a pick to play Bass but couldn’t find one. So I found a piece of plastic and cut out what was to become the Bass Wing. Then I started using the shape in a thumb pick, but it broke, and I accidentally developed a Fin at the top of the pick. Cooper agreed it was a good idea, and Cooper Picks was born.
Read on if you want a little more detail…
As a senior at Chatsworth High School in Los Angeles, I was approached by my best friend, Richard Gabai, to start a band. Richard was a great guitarist (and songwriter), so even though I also played guitar, I took on the bass. We quickly met drummer Casey Fleming, and we became The Checks.
Because I had played guitar with a pick and was into the LA New Wave music scene, I preferred the twangy, bright tones that came from playing bass with a pick. So I kept using it.
The band eventually played at some of the well-known LA music clubs: Madame Wongs, Coconut Teaszers, FM Station, and Trancas, but eventually, I left town to get an MBA at UC Berkeley and generally stopped playing to focus on family. The bass didn’t go well with sleeping kids, and soon it was tucked away…
[Pretend a calendar is flipping pages…many years go by.]
Then one Saturday night, I had the house to myself. I couldn’t even remember the last time I picked up my bass, so I figured it was the perfect time to pull it out and turn up my amp.
The only problem was that by the time I found my bass, amp and cords, I couldn’t find any of my trusty Fender medium, large triangle picks (346). But no worries. I found a piece of flat plastic and grabbed some scissors. I started thinking about how I was holding the pick and came up with a unique shape where the top was wide but the point was moved forward, and the side of my thumb was much closer to the strings. And it gave me a grip like I had never felt before. I had more accuracy and better control. I started refining it and eventually created the Bass Wing.
That project didn’t go much further. I was using the pick, but a pick for bass players isn’t a
giant business idea, so I didn’t do much with it. Cooper agreed. (But he’s biased, and probably was just angling for a treat.)
Then the Pandemic hit. With ample extra time, I decided to create a studio in my office
and record all the songs I had ever written.
I started playing guitar more often, using my bass pick for the bass sections. But I quickly realized that the Bass Wing shape was not conducive to the guitar because the forward tip sometimes pulled on the pick on the upstroke of a strum.
I started experimenting with a Herco pick. It’s a thumb pick but with a regular pick on the end instead of a narrow point. I cut the pick so it had only a small edge that paralleled the side of my thumb, so I could use my fingers to pick the guitar, but then strum as if I was using my thumb. It allowed me to immediately switch back and forth from fingerpicking to strumming without having to move the pick.
But it was PAINFUL. The plastic loop around my thumb dug into my skin, and I hated using it. So I got a lighter, melted the plastic to make it wider for my thumb, and it was much more comfortable. My second pick design! I started experimenting with my strumming picks until one of them broke as I was putting it on my thumb. I stared at it for a few seconds, amazed at what I was looking at.
The part that wrapped around my thumb where I had melted it had snapped off creating a perfectly curved fin sticking up at the top. Then I tried playing with it. I was stunned at the grip I had. By curving the top of the pick along the inside of my thumb. I was able to hold the pick much more tightly or much more gently. It just felt more comfortable and gave me a better grip. And the Speedstrum was created.
At the same time, my nephew, Uriah, had launched a start-up that gave me access to manufacturing the pick. With his help, I designed and produced a line of picks with a “Fin” on different pick shapes. I started with the Bass Wing and the SpeedStrum. Then I added the fin to the most popular pick shapes: the Standard (a Fender 351), the Jazz XL and Jazz III, and the Triangle – based on my old Fender.
At that point all I needed was a name. At first, I used Studio Pro, with the idea that the picks would be used to record very specific types of playing. But that was too descriptive. I needed something better. After about two months of going through many options, the answer came up and licked me in the face. Cooper wanted consideration. About 10 seconds later, I gave him a treat and started choosing fonts.
And Cooper Innovations was born…
Cooper Innovations, USA
Lafayette, CA
