Cover Story: Weird Science

Unable to substantially grow its business via catalog prospecting alone — the costs were too prohibitive — Steve Spangler Science launched its first website in 2000. Up to that point, the company had marketed its products to teachers only. Little did it know a whole market was left untapped.

"Pre-internet, we had people who wanted to meet with us and handle catalog distribution," recalls Steve Spangler, the company's founder and namesake. "They wanted us to ramp up catalog prospecting to see if there were other people out there who wanted this besides teachers. But it was just too expensive for a little company like ours. We decided the real focus had to be online. Once we went online, we found that our market wasn't just limited to teachers."