New tool concept

[joker]

Hello guys. Got a question. I have developed a new tool concept and I'm wondering who I may contact to either sell my idea? I have built three prototypes and have used them for over a year with great results. This item would be very useful to the beginner as well and the master crafter. I have contacted Tandy and they stated that they don't take outside ideas. Any help would be great!

Thanks for the help

Everette

[kiwican]

First thing I would do is check to see if its been done before. Patent office!

[joker]

I can try to check that. I've never seen anything like it. I really thought Tandy would at least be interested, oh well.

[bikermutt07]

I would contact a patent attorney. Those invention places are liable to rip off your idea.

[kiwican]

plenty of other places out there that are not Tandy, depends what you want to do with your idea. Do you want to sell the idea or do you want to sell the product

[joker]

I would like to sell the idea if possible. I am a full time welder and blew out my back about 4 months ago. Looking to do leather full time and that would come in handy for start up money.

[Norton Custom Leather]

the poor mans trademark / copy write,

you can take pictures of your product, & measurements.

 put your ideas on paper explaining what your product is & what it does or is for.  then mail it to yourself.

when it arrives to your house DO NOT open the letter. it is sealed, date & time stamped. 

then get your copy write / trademark applied for. this will secure it as yours thru the proper channels, (gov). 

iv done this & it is sustainable in court if you had to go that far  

[chrstn53]

Save yourself some time from the get go and do a thorough patent search. Back when I was in school I spent a fair amount of time on patent law in my business law class. The professor specialized in Patent law and stated that about 90% of the ideas that walked in his office had already been patented one or more times. He would tell us about all of these crazy things that people would come up with that seemed unique, but there would already be a patent on the creation or some major function of the creation. According to my professor a big portion of the patents have never been produced and that there are people/companies who do nothing but file patents for everything they come up with in hopes that down the road someone will buy the idea. The plus side is that if your idea is already patented and you can improve the designs function you might still have a shot.

[bikermutt07]

7 hours ago, Norton Custom Leather said:

the poor mans trademark / copy write,

you can take pictures of your product, & measurements.

 put your ideas on paper explaining what your product is & what it does or is for.  then mail it to yourself.

when it arrives to your house DO NOT open the letter. it is sealed, date & time stamped. 

then get your copy write / trademark applied for. this will secure it as yours thru the proper channels, (gov). 

iv done this & it is sustainable in court if you had to go that far  

That's a great idea.

[electrathon]

 

8 minutes ago, bikermutt07 said:

That's a great idea.

A lot of people do this and the trick is to mail yourself a letter that is not sealed.  Do it every so often and then when you need to show that you had the idea three years ago you pull out the envelope with the needed date, put in a backdated letter and seal it shut.  That way you can go to a lawyer and open it in from of them, it will prove that you had the idea years earlier (I have been told that this is why a sealed letter is not accepted as legal proof).  Keep in mind, a patent is very expensive.  $15,000 if all is easy, up to lots if it gets complicated.

[bikermutt07]

7 minutes ago, electrathon said:

 

A lot of people do this and the trick is to mail yourself a letter that is not sealed.  Do it every so often and then when you need to show that you had the idea three years ago you pull out the envelope with the needed date, put in a backdated letter and seal it shut.  That way you can go to a lawyer and open it in from of them, it will prove that you had the idea years earlier (I have been told that this is why a sealed letter is not accepted as legal proof).  Keep in mind, a patent is very expensive.  $15,000 if all is easy, up to lots if it gets complicated.

Now I'm confused..... Wouldn't a sealed letter be the perfect proof?

[chrstn53]

27 minutes ago, bikermutt07 said:

Now I'm confused..... Wouldn't a sealed letter be the perfect proof?

A sealed letter mailed to yourself might hold up for something in small claims court, but I could not see it holding up in any higher court unless the other guy has very poor representation. I could see it working if all possible openings are sealed with security coded evidence tape and notarized by an actual official at the court house. Even if you do all of this and someone steals your idea and patents it, you would still have a hard time proving the other party stole it.

[Art]

A letter and drawings etcetera, time and date stamped in your lawyers files might be a little better, but if someone applies for a patent for the same thing, the patent will win.  There are many stories of he who got to the patent office first, e.g. Elisha Gray vs. Alexander Bell.

Art

[electrathon]

1 hour ago, bikermutt07 said:

Now I'm confused..... Wouldn't a sealed letter be the perfect proof?

Not at all.  Zero proof.

You mail the letter unsealed, that gets a date stamp on it. Then three years later you add the contents. You now have proof that you had the idea years earlier.  

[Chain]

It's not worth the price of the stamp

https://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2006/08/25/the-myth-of-poor-mans-copyright/

[joker]

The item I have came up with would help many in the leather business. Not really looking to get rich, just be able to hang up my welding helmet and start doing leather full time.

[RockyAussie]

In what area of leather work does this tool help with? Is it a hand tool or a machine or marketing?

[joker]

It's a tool for letter stamps

[Studio-N]

I think I know what it is. I just laid out a drawing to machine one to donate to my local maker space. I'm sure I saw a picture on another forum or ebay so the cat may be out of the bag. you certainly would need one for each letter set. best of luck.

[joker]

I've never seen one before. Post the link or a pic.

[RockyAussie]

Welding/metalwork I would say no more. Check on google for the patent, that is fairly easy. If you cant find it after a heavy search then a patent application is not that dear. If approved you then have something to sell or license.Keep in mind if you can get a good batch done and the cost is affordable than many would buy from you anyway and the cost of patent is often debatable anyway. If you have not the money to protect the patent then better to you the money to swamp the market as best you can and they cant patent it if it is already common knowledge. Get my drillft.

[joker]

Did some digging around on Google search today. Couldn't find anything like what I built. So I'm thinking maybe the cat isn't out of the bag just yet.

[joker]

Hey guys, thank you for all the input on this, I really appreciate it. I haven't posted much on here for awhile. Between my full time job and my leather work it seems like I go 24/7. There were some good response to my question. One thing that bothered me though was the inquiry's about what my idea was. This is something that I put a lot of time and thought into. I would just hate to see it end up with someone's else's name on it. I know there are people here that are a lot more knowledgeable about this subject than I am. Just to easy for someone with the backing and financial means to take and run with my idea. 

Thanks for all the help guys

Joker

Edited July 21, 2016 by joker

[Studio-N]

You said the evil empire wouldn't consider it. Have you tried Springfield Leather as a possible patron?

[electrathon]

The reason people asked what it was is often times you think you have a new idea and soon find out others already do it.  It is nearly impossible to converse about a topic without knowing even the topic you are talking about.  Most ideas are not knew and most ideas are not financially viable.  Even the ones that are usually do not succeed due to the management of it.  People are not trying to steal your idea, they are attempting to assist you.

Assuming you can have this built (assuming you can not build a production run of it) for $4,000 each and assuming you can sell it for $6,000 each you can have a small run of them made for about $100,000 and assuming people want and like the unknown item you can likely make $32,000 profit in the next few years that it takes to sell it.  Deduct your overhead to run your company and you will know how much the product is really worth.  Most people find out that their item is worth less than they originally thought.  A few make money.