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Young Entrepreneur Carves a Creative Niche with USB DrivesHow Flash Pals is gaining traction with its fuzzy animal-themed storage devices.

ByJodi Helmer

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Finding a cute flash drive for his girlfriend's birthday proved more difficult than Doug Stienstra imagined. At the time a student atThe University of Iowa, Stienstra searched the mall and the internet, disappointed to find that the nontraditional flash drives on the market were unattractive and overpriced. So he took a DIY approach: He bought a fuzzy finger puppet from a toy store and glued it to a standard USB drive. The gift was a hit.

"All of her friends loved the flash drive and started asking me to make one for them," recalls Stienstra, now 23. "I knew I was onto something."

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