Architect Sally Dominguez became an inventor out of necessity. “I got pregnant in the middle of seven jobs on the go. It wasn’t planned,” she says.

“So I had to shut my office and then I found myself at home, just sitting looking at a baby in a highchair and I thought, ‘What am I going to do next? I think I am going to redesign this highchair!’”

The result was her invention of the “Nest”, a rounded plastic high chair which Dominguez and her business partner Susan Burns started manufacturing through BUG (Beautiful Useful and Green) Designs in 2001. The Nest won them an Australian DesignMark for Innovation in Design and a place in the Permanent Collection of Australia’s Powerhouse Museum.

But the recognition that’s mattered most to Dominguez came after her invention of the Rainwater Hog, a flat rainwater collection tank she designed in 2003, to fit under her patio. After beginning manufacture of this modular plastic tank in Australia and meeting with much success, Dominguez introduced it into the US market in late 2007.

The next year, the Hog won the Spark International Design Award and was also listed as one of the Top Ten Green Building Products in the US. “When we were listed as a ‘Top Ten’ product... we knew we were onto something big. It was an endorsement. It gave us an entrée into that market,” Dominguez says.

Dominguez and her family relocated to the US, where they rented a house in San Francisco and began American production of the Hog. “It was shocking timing,” she admits. “The Global Financial Crisis struck and we flat-lined with the business.”

After weathering this economic storm, her business is now picking up and Dominguez is expanding into Japan. She also has other inventions in the pipeline, such as natural waterless shampoo.

“My advice to young inventors is, remember that ideas are a dime a dozen. Even having drawings is not enough,” Dominguez says. “If you have a new invention, then take it, prototype it, build it, test it and enter it in competitions.”