THE MAN BEHIND SLIDEDOWNS: SAL CORIO

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Sal Corio of SlideDown fast and easy tie downs, Warwick, Rhode Island

Raised in a family jewelry business, Sal handed out his first business card at age nine, promoting his snow shoveling enterprise. By age 14, he was taking flying lessons from barnstormer and world War II Navy flight instructor Sabbi Ludovici. “Sabbi was more concerned about correctly tying his airplane down than flying,” Sal said. He soloed shortly after his 16th birthday, and has been flying ever since, enjoying regular flights to AirVenture, Sun n’ Fun and other aviation events. And the importance of securing an airplane obviously lodged in his mind.

Watching folks tie down their airplanes – some attacking their knot problem by just adding more knots – he knew there had to be a simpler solution. “I used a friend’s machine shop and after several design modifications, SlideDown was created,” he said. 

Sal had graduated from the University of Rhode Island in 1983 and by 1984 he was in the commercial auction business, putting him literally in touch with a variety of industrial machinery. “By 2012, I got inspired to begin making these things. Through my liquidations, I started acquiring the equipment I needed so I could make them myself.”

Rhode Island’s motto is simply “Hope” and Sal did a lot of that as he strolled past the hundreds of tied-down airplanes at Oshkosh, hoping he would not see anything that would make his design redundant. “I just  knew  they were out there somewhere.” But no one else had produced anything like his elegant “slide-down” design, so he decided, “I’m gonna make these things so the user doesn’t have to tie a knot. Sometimes, God puts you in just the right place,” he added, and explains that while camped at AirVenture’s North Forty, he became acquainted with the nearby campers. One happened to be a patent attorney, and helped him through that process.

In 2013 he loaded a pallet of SlideDowns bound for AirVenture, “Including a return bill of lading for the whole shipment in case no one wanted them,” he said. Skeptical people would grab a set and ask,“Does this thing really work?” After a quick demo, Sal would make a sale, then another, then another. . . “By day five or six, we were completely sold out.” Aircraft Spruce saw the potential and became Sal’s first distributor. He learned how to apply graphics to the radial surface, and now you’ll see branded SlideDowns sporting logos like the RAF. Sal reached out to AOPA, and ever since the year of the prize Debonair, its sweepstakes aircraft includes a set. “AOPA doesn’t go anywhere without their SlideDowns,” he said.

 “Aviation is really my passion – always has been, and this business has connected me to people I’d never have met,” Sal says. He manages time to serve as president of the dynamic Rhode Island Pilot Association, and supports the RAF mission as well.

Another of his passions is producing his popular product entirely in his own shop with local employees. He’s had offers to multiply sales if production goes offshore. “Not gonna happen,” he says. He’s seen the sad results when manufacturing leaves its home place in search of cheaper production. “That’s when I end up liquidating someone’s dream,” he said. Nearby Providence used to be the costume jewelry capital of the world, but those factories stand silent, no longer buzzing with activity. “I was looking to make a quality tie-down entirely in Rhode Island. That’s how we’ve grown this little company,” he says, and is fulfilling his native state’s adage of “hope.”

 Get your set at the RAF Outfitter, and learn more about all SlideDown products here.

By Carmine Mowbray
Submitted June 10, 2025

Posted in News