I stumbled across an “Ask the Expert” style article in today’s Peoria (Illinois) Journal Star (my wife’s neck of the woods) where the question asked was essentially “how do I pursue an idea for an invention from the ground up.” The article is pretty thin on useful information, but one phrase caught my eye: ”Better Business Bureau (BBB).”
Why? The BBB is a great resource for doing research about local companies, and is a less useful tool for researching out of state companies.
Why? Because when out of state companies defraud people…those same people do not call the BBB in the other state to report the misconduct. It just doesn’t happen. As such, even awful companies can have good (or no) history with their local BBB.
How is this relevant to independent inventors? It is my opinion that an invention promotion company that has a “good” or “neutral” rating with their local BBB is indicative of nothing. Don’t rely on it. I don’t know how many times I have talked to an inventor who has been bilked or scammed by an invention promotion company and heard the inventor say “but the Better Business Bureau gave them a good rating.
See also my previous post: All about Invention Promotion Companies.
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