It's the classic entrepreneurial scenario: a man with a certain set of skills sees a need and sets about filling it.

It was all Ginger's doing. Ginger was John Acree's English Bulldog. She went through a lot of dog beds.

"Ginger was just so hard on them," Acree recalled.

He knew that there had to be a way to make dog beds durable enough to stand up to Ginger.

"I started tinkering with them and taking the bed apart," he said.

Acree had a background well-suited to improving an existing product. Since 1998, he had been a specialty drapery contractor; he knew fabric and he had sewing skills.

"I th...