HEY, THEY ACTUALLY MADE MY IDEA!!!
Seriously! I sent Kelite a PM back in October saying, "what you guys need to do is design a gel frame that fits on a clip light". I was thinking some sort of universal mount that attaches to any fixture for about $10. I saw some pictures of early mock ups on Kelite's desk. Looks like they gave up on my universal frame idea and decided to throw in the fixture too. Yeah it's about twice the cost of a clip lamp at Home Depot but it's neat and clean to deal with. You could make one yourself with A 9" gel frame, but that would run you another $8 and then you've got to figure out how to attach it all together. Now you don't ever have to deal with removing crusty old gaff and trying to evenly bend a square cut of gel around a the round shade of the lamp. Remember that $75 for a 4 pack is the list price so you can probably get them for around $15 each. I'm so cool to think of this and you should all support me by buying them. I know half of you don't believe me but it's really true!
Alas, young Jedi lighting designer, you were indeed the inspiration behind the ClipLight and we thank you for your comments while we prototyped the unit! Apollo's own KC Hooper has also offered timely suggestions as we began producing the stainless steel gel frame and programing the PerfGel cutter for this fixture.
This product wasn't introduced to the market as a get-rich-quick scheme, but rather as an on the shelf option for those theater folk that haven't the time to bolt/rivet/tape their own lights for use backstage.
And yes it's true, various Apollo dealers sell below MSRP, making these lights less costly than one might consider a professional clip light to be. Whether 100 4-packs sell or 10,000 head out the door, we merely wanted to respond to a request from the theatrical lighting community for a cleaner product.
Please do respond with your thoughts and comments regarding the Cliplight's actual value/use gang, as your input is very important to us-
(Now- back to catching up with my trip report to Prolight + Sound, and the multiple other opportunities that have presented themselves during my absence!)