The War on Rodents

July 27, 2007 -- ABC News caught up with the inventor of Repel-X, man's latest weapon in the war on vermin. Joe Dee supplies more than a million bags a week in the fight against one of man's peskiest problems.

Joe, tell us about this new bag you've invented and what inspired this invention.

Our company, the JAD Corp., has provided plastic garbage bags to the city for more than 40 years. A number of years ago, one of our clients called us up and said, "There's a photograph in the paper, and it's our building and your bags are outside and there's little children playing there with communion suits on, and there's about a half-dozen rats, crawling over the bags. So we set out to find a product that would work, that would not harm children or harm pets. And we did research and in our research we found that rodents have very, very sensitive sinuses -- as do cockroaches.

Is this being marketed outside of New York?

There are rats all over the world. But we're going after all of them

I understand you are selling more than 1 million bags a week. Who are your main customers?

We have sold Repel-X bags to approximately 3,000 to 4,000 buildings in New York City. We are finding that 85 to 90 percent of the orders go out into the residential segment of our customer base in New York City.

What types of chemicals do the Repel-X bags use?

They use all natural ingredients, and it's very safe for humans and animals. The repellency won't come off on your hands because the repellant is part of the manufacturing process.

What's next for you?

We actually are testing these bags right now in Pennsylvania for bears. And if the repellency works with the bears, there's a whole myriad of products that can be made for camping, tenting, equipment, which would be very safe.