They're nuts.... I just found a Chinese web site selling our Ghostly Linking Finger Rings for 90-percent under our price. What can we do? Nothing... even uses our names in the copy. If they are anything like the few other ripoffs I've sampled they are junk.

Pete,
I can't imagine the frustration you must experience as an inventor.

Just know that the professionals in this business know that you get what you pay for. After all you'll never find a new REAL Porsche for the price of any family car. We know that the best costs more for a reason (that is not to say that everything that is expensive is of high quality)

The few times I have mistakenly bought a second-class item (usually on ebay labeled as an original), I have gotten the item and immediately realized my mistake. Most of those items ended up in the trash.

No matter what the fakers produce, the original will always be the best because is was made by someone that used the product and can pass on their experience to others.

As for the amateur that buys the knock off, they either just want to know the method (but never the real secrets). I agree that knock-offs cheapen the art (and the original), but I know far too many people that will make something rather than buy all the wisdom of the creator. The secret-seekers and money savers will eventually learn that quality doesn't cost more, it's priceless.

The knockoffs never look, or perform like a real one.

Joey D

Does Joe Porper hallmark his items?

Is there anyway to tell that an item is being purchased is a Joe Porper original?

Does Joe Porper not sell to China?

They copied the hallmark, Joe's signature, the instructions and even a description on how wonderful Pete Biro and Joe Porper are, etc., etc., blah, blah, blah.
The first way to notice the fake is the instruction sheets are slightly off-size, not fully 8 1/2 x 11 (they are metric paper sizes).
Joe sells things wholesale to dealers and has no control over who buys and sends over there.

Wake up and smell the egg rolls. This has been going on for over 10 years. They buy one piece and just make it. I have some of my items knocked off in over 16 countries. China is notorious.
Some of the problem, is that when dealers out-source the production of their items, the Chinese producer feels that they can make as many as they want and actually competes with that dealer.
BTW Tannens used to make exact copies of items and just sold them as the original. Exact copies in a wholesalers inventory are hard to prove.
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It is also the consumer contributing to this. I have a friend who buys coin shells from China at .75 each.
Ebay has tons of the items for sale, but you (as manufacturer) can have ebay pull the item if you prove it is yours.

If they are using your names you most certainly should be able to use theirs.
I would badmouth them at every opportunity. Post a warning on your website.
If they sell on eBay - file a complaint. Doesn't U.S. Customs confiscate fake handbags?
They should do the same for you. Your Congressman should help you file a claim.

My congresswoman can't even run her own job.
We have tried many things and none work.

Most items from Singapore and China seem to never hit customs on an individual basis. Small, under 13 oz. items seem to fly under the radar. There are just no resources available to police the volume of individual sales.

Nope - Customs can't do a thing. No good answer to this. Pete posts this same thread over and over - just the product name changes from time to time. I guess he is hoping that it will alert people to check carefully when they order. But when people order these fakes they KNOW darn well it's fake based on the price alone. ("Oh, I really thought it was a genuine Porper product! I just thought it was a really, really, really good sale..." - Yeah, right.)

The handbags that are confiscated have trademark protection, which I doubt that Joe has on any of his items. Very expensive to obtain and maintain.

Jim

Yeah, but you'll get what you paid for. The quality will not be the same, and on an item like this, it does matter.

RIGHT when it breaks you are out whatever.

Where else it hurts is that they often contact Pete or Joe because it doesn’t work right, or it is broken. Sucks all around.

Jim

One of the reasons pharmaceutical companies have to charge higher prices for their products is because the companies, who are always being ridiculed by the mainstream media, know that they need to make back their investment before their product gets knocked off. I imagine that Biro and Porper spent considerable time, money, and energy working out the details before actually going into the production stage. Prototypes don't make themselves!

Where are the duty charges? It should end up costing about the same -no?

This is an international economy now, we trade and deal with all the countries, even communist countries, all of the high tariffs have been done away with thanks to the Republicans running congress.

That is why it is so important to do away with all those small attached "ear marks" that are passed with large bills in Congress. They have taken all the laws off of everything that governed our consumer laws, foreign and domestic.

Prototypes don't make themselves.

My Kinetic-key has been ripped off by a bunch of makers.

My last estimate is that over 75,000 have been sold and I havent seen a dime.

These Chinese companies sell wholesale to the U.S. so another problem is the possibility of getting a knockoff from an unscrupulous dealer here at home!

Ya know, I am amazed that ANYONE is making ANYTHING at all today (as far as Magic)...Back in the late 70's and early 80's I had about half a dozen effects I was thinking about marketing. Walter Gibson talked me out of it. He was in Nashua N.H. back then, and we talked on the phone regularly.

He predicted this very scenario! I'm glad I listened! I don't know how you guys do it. Pete Biro's latest problem just galvanizes my thinking...

Doug

One theory is to make a bunch of 'em... wholesale 'em, then forget what happens and create another, etc. etc.

Pete, that is exactly what Martin Breeze did with the Smoking a Thumb gimmick when he came out with it years ago. I emailed him when I heard about it, and that he was the one that made them. He wrote back, stating that he only had a 1000 made and shipped them all to the wholesalers. Nice deal for him, he sold all them at one time and was done with the project.