VerticallyEnhanced

Already did...have an email into him. You know..I don't want any money from her. I just want her to stop. In other words, use the mush in-between your ears to come up with your own freaking ideas! I know there is always a bit of emulating going on in our industry. I mean, we all look at industry trends in the candle arena. However, I really try to be as original as possible and come up with designs that will set me apart from others. I have worked very hard to come up with my own image and it just royally chaps my ass that someone is literally taking the entire concept and running with it. Not "similar" but down right identical.

There is a candle maker that has gone from copying a few of my things to flat out trying to duplicate my entire set up at shows. I have a VERY distinctive "look" to my booth. Very distinctive. I have been doing this particular show for six years (same design) and she has been there for two. I have noticed more and more of my elements creeping in to her design. I blew it off. But I have just received my SIXTH email from a customer from the town where the show is held saying "I thought it was you...unitl I got up there." It is identical down to the jars, fabric, colors, lay out. One customer even went as far as to buy a candle and take it home only to find out it sucked. She emailed me asking why I had changed my candles, my name and labels a bit. I was scratching my head...then I finally figured it out. She thought I had hired someone to run my booth for me. Crazy... Anyone dealt with this? Followed through with trade dress complaint? I am kind of getting past the "eh whatever" to being flat out pissed. Here is an over view of trade dress...sure seems to fit: TRADE DRESS LAW OVERVIEW “Trade dress” refers to the total image of a product, including features such as size, shape, color or color combinations, texture, graphics, or particular sales techniques. Protection for trade dress is similar to protection for trademarks and service marks. Trade Dress Infringement in Violation of Section 43(a) of the Lanham Act The purpose of trade-dress protection is to enable a business to identify itself efficiently as the source of a given product through the adoption of a mark which may be in the form of a slogan, symbol, ornamental design or other visual insignia. In order for a claimant to prevail on its Lanham Act claim, it must establish by a preponderance of the evidence the following: 1. That the trade dress of the claimant’s product or services is inherently distinctive or has acquired secondary meaning; 2. That the claimant’s trade dress is primarily non-functional; and 3. That alleged infringer’s trade dress is confusingly similar, causing a likelihood of confusion in the marketplace. First Element – Inherent Distinctiveness or Secondary Meaning A trade dress in inherently distinctive if it is fanciful, arbitrary, or suggestive. A trade dress has acquired secondary meaning when a consumer associates the design feature with a particular producer. In order to determine whether secondary meaning exists, one may consider the following factors: 1. The amount and manner of advertising of the claimant’s products or services; 2. The volume of sales for the claimant’s products or services; 3. The length and manner of use of the products or services; 4. Direct consumer testimony; 5. Consumer surveys; 6. Evidence of intentional copying; and 7. Evidence of misdirected inquiries. Second Element – Trade Dress is Primarily Nonfunctional A nonfunctional design feature is a mere arbitrary embellishment or a form of dress for goods that is primarily adopted for purposes of identification and individuality and that is unrelated to basic consumer demands in connection with the product. A non-functional design feature can be a slogan, a symbol, a combination of words and symbols, an ornamental feature, a distinctive shape, or something else intended to remind a consumer of a brand. Functional features are not those which serve a function, but are those that a competitor would find necessary to include in his product in order to effectively compete in the market. A feature is also functional when it is costly to do without or to design around, rather than one that is costly to have. Third Element – Likelihood of Confusion If the claimant has established by a preponderance of the evidence that the trade dress of its products or services have acquired secondary meaning or is inherently distinctive, and are also nonfunctional, then one must consider whether the alleged infringer’s use of the claimant’s trade dress is likely to cause confusion in the marketplace. This means that the alleged infringer’s use of the claimant’s trade dress is likely to confuse a reasonable purchaser about the source of the alleged infringer’s products or services or the claimant’s connection with them. To determine whether a likelihood of confusion exists, you may consider the following factors: 1. The degree of similarity between the trade dress of the claimant’s products or services and the trade dress of the alleged infringer’s products or services; 2. The similarity between the products in question. 3. Whether the products or services are distributed through similar channels of trade and to similar ultimate customers; 4. The degree of care likely to be exercised by consumers (as evidenced by the amount spent to purchase the products or services and the atmosphere surrounding the products or services in their normal setting); 5. The strength of the secondary meaning of the claimant’s trade dress in the public mind; 6. Evidence of actual confusion; and 7. The alleged infringer’s intent to pass of their products or services as those of the claimant. However, none of the foregoing factors in itself disposes of the likelihood of confusion question. Actual Confusion The most positive and substantial proof of likelihood of confusion is actual confusion, and very little proof of actual confusion is necessary to prove likelihood of confusion. However, it is not necessary for there to be actual confusion for you to find a likelihood of confusion. Damages for Trade Dress Infringement If a judge or jury finds that the alleged infringer has violated Section 43(a) of the Lanham Act, then the claimant is entitled to recover any damages sustained by the claimant as well as the infringer’s profits realized in connection with its infringing products or services, and the Court may award treble damages where such violation was willful. Recovery for trademark infringement is not limited to cases in which the amount of actual damages is demonstrated. Rather, the claimant may recover profits reaped by the infringer from its infringing activity. In assessing profits, the claimant is only required to prove the infringer’s sales. The burden then shifts to infringer to prove costs or deductions. Exceptional Case Exceptional cases are those “in which the acts of infringement can be characterized as malicious, fraudulent, deliberate, or willful.” Treble damages and attorneys’ fees may be awarded by the court in exceptional cases.

I had one of those this week. The customer wanted me to drive 60 miles round trip to deliver ONE clamshell. I simply explained it would have to wait until my normal delivery day. I offered to mail it to her for $.50 but she "didn't want to pay extra." My other one is people who expect free crap. My favorite is "You should give me my candles for free because I give such good word of mouth advertising for you." This is after this person already gets a pretty deep discount off of her stuff.

Okay...Bert suggested I ask you guys here. I am sorry, I know it is probably somewhere on the 568 pages which compose this thread, but I am going cross eyed trying to find it. I ordered the following: Angel Juicy Fruit Redwood & Cedar Andes Thin Mint Candy cane When I test I start out with my normal wicking and then do new candles if I need to wick up. (I just don't like yanking wicks and using the same candle) I also start off with 7% (1.2oz per pound). I use straight 415 with only UV additive. Are any of these wicker uppers? Are any of these ones I can really go down on percentages with my wax? I appreciate it. I would really like to start out as close to the mark as possible in hope to save at least a little time on my testing. Also, has anyone compared Bert's Angel to BCS? And does the Juicy Friut smell anything like BNLs All Hallow's Eve? Thanks!

and the are ones that you have NOT used for testing?? i.e. fresh jars...ones that have never had candles poured in them? If yes, then I would be very nervous...as islandgirl said, it could be a flaw in the lot. In all the years I have done this, the ONLY jar I have ever had crack was one someone wanted me to fill that they had burned a LOT of candles in. It was the same as mentioned above...it had been heated/cooled many times over. Because of that, I don't do fills in customer's jars.

I do too...I think it is theleast we can do after all their trips lugging our heavy crap!

Okay, so the big question is, did you tip him? :spit:

There is a lot of info out here: http://www.candletech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58962&highlight=insurance+texas http://www.candletech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27885&highlight=insurance+texas http://www.candletech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20423&highlight=insurance+texas http://www.candletech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=16529&highlight=insurance+texas there is more...I just copied/pasted some of the links that came up from my search.

I am thinking it could be a great marketing tool...how would you list thaton your site? Island Girl Candles - covers up your s*it Island Girl Candles - no one will smell your stinky a$$ Yeah, I can see this being a positive thing!

Join the club! Even when I talk to myself...then I argue with myself and it is just a big mess! I have used all the ones you mentioned with this wax and have always stuck with the CDs. Your oil of choice just stuck out when I read it because I am testing one right now that is an earthy one and I am about to pull my hair out. You could possible get the wicking done on this one, think you are good to go, then go make something that is an easy wicker and end up with a five inch deep melt pool.

Okay, so chuckle for the day: "The hemp shroomed liked crazy." I just have this mental picture of a hippy doing shrooms for some reason. I just wanted to mention that if you are trying to get a general idea of which wicks you like with a certain jar, I would think vanilla patchouli would be a bad oil to try it with. Again, I could just be reading your post wrong, but I took it as you trying to find a general wicking that will work for the jar and the oil was kind of mentioned as an after thought. I am just thinking back to when I was trying to find a good wick type/size for my jars. I would test a pretty "normal" oil that I knew not to be a bugger to wick and once I got that one down, I would move to the harder wickers from there. I don't carry a vanilla patchouli, but I do carry other oils with either vanilla or patchouli in them, and they are notoriously the ones I really have to play with to get the right wicking.

The article is so dead on. Many of us make candles where we also live, where we are always exposed to it. I liken it to my parent's house. My parents house (where I lived from the age of 5-19) has a certain smell. It is not a "bad" smell, but just their smell. Now, when I go home, I walk in and it is like "Oh cool! I am home!" When we come home and open the suitcase, my kids will even say, "Oh it smells like Mimi and Papa's house!" My parents don't smell it and I never noticed it when I lived there. But now that I am desensitized, it can pick it out in a heartbeat. edited to add...that is why I make four candles every time I test a scent. I keep one to burn for checking out the wicking and the other three are farmed out to testers who I really trust. Plus they are nice enough to put up with my anal five page testing package. lol...

http://tax.ohio.gov/ Ohio Department of Taxation

Yeah, I already told her. I need to tell the candle maker too in case it was maybe a legitimate mistake.

I don't when I put it in candles, but I got the most horrid rancid smell when I made it for my catalytic lamp.

So I bought a fundraiser candle from a friend's daughter to help out her dance team. I ordered a 10oz apoth jar. I usually will buy other handmade candles when I come across them...I just like to see how other candles stack up. I have found some great ones and some duds, but this is the first one that I scared the crap out of me. It was double wicked. I think it is a soy blend. It was SO over-wicked that in 30-40 minutes, the melt pool was at least (if not over) an inch deep. The thing that really put the fear of "house fire" in my head was that the flames were constantly dancing and occasionally doing so OUTSIDE the rim of the candle. Now you and I know when you burn a candle, you keep it away from flammable objects which I did. Actually after seeing how fast it burned, I set it in the sink. I was curious to see just how deep I could get the melt pool say in minutes of burn time, but fear won out and I extinguished it. Had there been anything flammable (paper, curtains, etc) within 3-4 inches of this candle, I am convinced it would have gone up in flames. the other thing that paled in comparison was the weight. It was labeled a 10oz Nt. Wt. candle. Now I can somewhat understand being a up or down an ounce when you are hand pouring candles, but I put the candle on the scale prior to the first burn and it weighed 14.1 ounces. It was a very heavy glass jar...I bet it weighs more than four ounces.

this is the cheapest place I have found on line and they offer free shipping http://www.popeilfamilystore.com/stefry.html

The only downfall with propay is that you have to sign up via snail mail and it takes a while...two weeks if I remember coorectly. This may have changed since I signed up, so maybe someone who has signed up recently could let you know if it is still the same.

I finally gave up and have my labels printed elsewhere. My kids were being exposed to way too many colorful words and I was wasting way too many labels. I will say that I have noticed that Avery labels were the worst for me. When I started buying from onlinelabels.com, I noticed that they did it less, but still had issues. I remember your frustration well, one would print out great and then the next two would be scrapped. I tried everything: calibrating it, using the medium print types, printing with no paper in the tray under it, printing with paper in the tray, printing with various numbers of sheets of paper, etc. I went through three printers, too, thinking it was a printer issue. HP, Epson and Lexmark.

I have used propay for shows for almost three years now and I love it. I have never had one single issue with them. I use paypal for my web orders but like you, needed something just for shows. I only do about four really big shows a year, so I did not need something I would be using every weekend. I don't call my orders in...I tried, but it was causing too much of a back up at my check-out booth. I use a knuckle buster too and then process the cards when I get home. I make sure I get a phone number on the slip just in case there are issues. The only "issue" I have had in the three years is if one of the numbers is unreadable on the slip. It has only happened maybe three times and the customers were always very helpful when I called, giving me the correct number.

Tess...do you have a Michaels near you? They had their baskets on sale 40% off this week and I remember seeing some bushel type baskets.

Had some more thoughts and hit "post" to fast! :rolleyes2 Another idea I have seen...at the show, put a coupon in the bag for 10% off their next web order. Another good way to bring customers to your show is to put a show schedule on your web page. I briefly looked and did not see one on your site. I actually put a coupon on my site for customers to print off and bring to the show.

I maintain a database for each city/area I do a show in and collect email addresses at the show. Prior to doing a show in that area, I will email them with a coupon. I get tons of repeat customers that way!

I looked through my bookmarks... found this http://soapmakingbusiness.com/Handmade_Soap_Displays/Floor_Displays.html Maybe you have someone handy who can look at it and duplicate a table top model. I would offer my hubby's services (oh-he-who-can-look-at- something-and-build-it-for-me) but alas, he is booked up (with me) till 2054.

This won't angle em towards the customer, but I have always loved the look of votives in the big ole old fashioned candy jars. I have even seen some replicas at wally world. You could fill them, put a cute label on the outside and then keep extras under the table. Does that make any sense?? lol...I don't do stand alone votives (just pour mine in the flowerpots and sell them) so alas, no picture.