Pinellas Pair's Bikini-Bling Idea Gets Exposure On CNBC

For Mykini Blingz, things are moving fast.

The "swimsuit enhancement jewelry" idea just opened for business last month with a new Web site, and its two Pinellas County entrepreneurs were on national television tonight, pitching their product.

Katina Booth of Clearwater and Chris Buheit of Dunedin got the idea for removable jewelry that clips to swimsuits in May, when one of them washed a bikini and the jewelry attached to the suit fell off.

So they came up with an idea for a stainless-steel jewelry clip for bathing suits that can be removed when the suit is dropped into the washing machine. The invention also allows jewelry to be changed.

On Friday, Booth and Buheit shot a message to CNBC's "The Big Idea," which has a segment in which three competing inventors or entrepreneurs give 30-second pitches to three judges, who critique the ideas. The winner, determined by online voting, will be announced on the CNBC's "The Big Idea" Web site Tuesday.

The winners get marketing tips and business advice, Booth said, along with a featured page on the show's Web site.

The show aired at 10 p.m. Mykini Blingz was up against "Bibs and Match," bibs for babies that snap onto "snapsuits" as a replacement for tie-around bibs and their potential for strangulation or at least chafed necks, and "WellAlarm," a Web-based medical alert service on jewelry or iron-on clothing tags.

Booth, 35, and Buheit, 43, taped their 30-second pitch Monday morning in Tampa, and the taped segment was shown tonight.

Two out of the three judges on the show liked the idea. One said Booth had a "great pitch" and called Mykini Blingz a "fun idea." The dissenting judge said many bikinis sold these days already come with jewelry.

Voters can go to www.cnbc.com/id/26560369 to cast their votes.

Booth said within two hours of the time she sent a message to CNBC on Friday, she got a call from a producer who asked whether she could tape the segment this morning.

"I had been watching 'The Big Idea' for months," Booth said, and thought it would be a good way to begin marketing her product.

After coming up with the idea, making designs and getting a manufacturer to make it, "We just received our product two weeks ago," she said.

Booth was practicing her pitch this morning. The kicker:

"And guys, if you get caught looking at a pretty girl in a bikini, you can just say 'I was checking out her Blingz,' " she said.