IN the mid-1990s, at the age of 24, Michael Robinson was travelling the world with a friend after they both made a pact to quit their jobs working in Clitheroe.

After a 14-hour flight to Thailand and a 20-hour coach journey across Australia he was fed up of waking with a stiff neck and his face against the window.

It was these experiences that lit the provebial light bulb over Michael's head and he designed and patented an innovative L-shaped pillow that would allow the user to relax and sleep in an upright position in their seat.

But it was several years later before Michael, slightly disillusioned with the way things were going, made a throw away comment to his former boss Stuart Marks about whether he should pursue his idea.

Michael, now 36, said: "I had worked in Nelson at a marketing services company called Handling Solutions.

"My former boss was a great entrepreneur called Stuart Marks, a man who made his first million pounds at the age of 19.

"One day I was just talking to him about maybe going for it with The JetRest pillow I had patented and he turned round and gave me the slap across the face I needed.

He just said: 'Michael if you're going to do it, do it and if not just get a job.' It certainly helped me to make my mind up that I was going to go through with it!" Michael, who has a strong marketing background, spent another couple of years thinking over his business plan for The JetRest, after he had co-founded underoneroof.com -- the UK's first residential property website.

Just before the dotcom boom came to end at the turn of the new millennium Michael sold and left the business and finally decided to use The JetRest pillow to found Clear Prospects in May 2001.

He said: "After that I just thought well it's now or never with the pillow idea.

"I got together with a woman called Ann Dunnicliff, an experienced wedding dress maker and machinist, and it took us from May 2001 to December 2001 to go to a commercially viable product."

Michael started marketing the product by showcasing his design at various trade and public exhibitions.

Using only a web address, sewn into the strapping on the pillow, Michael started marketing the product to high street retailers with further avalaibility online.

He added: "We went on-line with it on the Friday and on the Monday the phone did not stop ringing from 8am to 8pm with interest in our product.

"From then on we never looked back. I took Ann on full-time and began to manufacter in and out of house using a cutting and sewing firm in Blackburn.

"We now also use a factory in China, one in Sri Lanka and one in Mexico to make our products.

"We have sold to 27 different countries around the world."

Around 90 per cent of sales of the JetRest are to retailers and the product is stocked by Boots and Harrods among others.

It has also won a number of awards and plaudits from trade magazines and national newspapers.

Clear Prospects Ltd -- based on Glenfield Business Park, Blackburn -- also won the coveted title of New Business of the Year at the 2004 Be Inspired Lancashire Business Awards.

Michael and his team of just three employees are now busy pushing the marketing of the Clear Prospects range in almost every area, from retail, mail order, corporate, travel, auto, healthcare and air travel.

As well as the JetRest pillow Clear Prospects' expanding range includes JetRest eye masks, DVT travel socks (to lower the chance of deep vein thrombosis while travelling on planes), the micro style travel coat hanger and a waterproof wrist wallet.

Michael, originally from Cumbria but who lives in Clitheroe, said: "For anyone else who has a great idea but can't decide whether to go for it I would say very much the same thing to them as was said to me.

"We live in a culture were everyone worries all the time, but sometimes the best way to do it is just to have a go and deal with the problems as they arise."