More News

Silver Spring residents might know Brett Hill as the guy who can fix their plumbing, heating system or electrical problems through his company Best-Hill Services Inc.

But after regional and national media put the spotlight on Hill's latest advertising ploy, Hill might be better known as the guy who can do anything with a toilet.

And he's fine with that.

"You can either keep doing the same thing everyone else is doing and be a follower, or you can create something new and different and think outside the box," said Hill of Silver Spring.

Hill's "Toilet Cycle," a blue, motorized three-wheeler with a toilet in place of a seat, debuted at this year's Montgomery County Agricultural Fair's Toilet Decorating Contest, which Hill sponsors. The "vehicle" has since been featured locally on NBC Channel 4 and was picked up nationally Oct. 9 on NBC's "Today Show" and in the "Oddball News" segment of "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" on MSNBC.

"This video shows [Hill] using the bike for transportation and it's not clear if the potty part actually works, but we're going to suggest if you're going to try, find a long stretch of straight and rural highway and do not bring the newspaper," Olbermann quipped during the segment.

The toilet took about 600 hours of work between February and August of this year and cost about $3,000, Hill said.

Hill's cousin Carl Adams, who did most of the building, was "the brains" behind the idea and Hill's 9-year-old son helped with the design.

Despite the cost and effort, Hill said the publicity from both the fair and the television segments has brought in a lot of business. Best-Hill Services is a home-based, contract company with only a few employees, including Hill's wife.

Rebecca Hill said she was skeptical of the idea but warmed to the attention the toilet received and the business it has garnered in tough economical times.

"It's not like he uses it as transportation, let's just clarify that," she said. "I've had friends call and say, ‘He doesn't drive around in that thing does he?'"

Brett Hill said the initial criticism from friends and family didn't faze him.

"Look at Thomas Edison, do you think everybody looked at his light bulb and said it was a good thing?" he joked.

The Hills said the idea for the Toilet Cycle came from brainstorming ideas for inexpensive publicity. Getting floats in local parades proved too expensive and too much work. So Hill decided to use the Toilet Decorating Contest he has sponsored for three years at the fair to launch the Toilet Scooter idea.

In previous years, Hill has designed a toilet to look like a horse farm, with the tank serving as a barn and the bowl serving as a pond. He even built one to look like a computer, with the tank designed as a mainframe and the flusher as a floppy disk.

The toilet decorating contest has quickly become one of the fair's most popular events thanks to Hill, said Martin Svrcek, executive director of Montgomery County Agricultural Center Inc.

"When John Crapper invented the toilet, he had no idea of what Brett Hill could do with the concept," Svrcek said, adding that the quirkiness of the event fits with the fair's overall theme. The fair also includes a vegetable-powered car derby and an amateur cheese carving contest.

Since the fair and the television spots, the toilet's schedule has been booked solid with an appearance in the Kensington Labor Day Parade and planned appearances in the Montgomery County Thanksgiving Parade in Silver Spring and the Gaithersburg Christmas parade.

"It's a different way of letting people know what my company name is," Hill said.