Walmart Holds Invention Contest

An anonymous reader writes "Walmart is holding the inventor's equivalent to 'American Idol' calling for product submissions that will be offered for sale in Walmart stores. Feel that the back scratcher you received a patent for hasn't garnered the attention it deserves? This could be your big chance at fame and fortune."

Fine Print...

[saccade.com]

Be very careful to read the fine print on contests like this. I looked into one a few years ago (run by Hammacher Schlemmer, I think), and by entering you essentially wound up giving them your IP at pretty unfavorable terms. If you have a good idea, something like KickStarter [kickstarter.com] is a much better bet.

Free Research for them at your expense.

[sethstorm]

While it might sound altruistic, it isn't.

Re:Free Research for them at your expense.

[furytrader]

Yes, because everyone assumes that Wal-Mart is a charity, right? Clearly, this is a way to generate interest in order to get people to come into their stores. Just like American Idol is about generating interest in a musician to get people to buy their music. Oh, the horror!

Re:Fine Print...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wal-Mart is a historically very dangerous partner, especially for small companies. Their high volume and low pricing come at the cost of any slack for their partners, who wind up on a treadmill of lowering per unit costs, and wind up "making up in volume what they lose on every sale". I've seen several smaller companies with products sold there start out very excited, but go very bankrupt within 5 years because they can't keep the prices down low enough to match Wal-Mart's demands without firing the staff who came up with the product.

It's a very dangerous tiger to grab the tail of for a small business, especially a small patent holder. If the patent will help pad your resume, I could see it, but don't rely on Wal-Mart to help you make money with it.

supply chain analyzer

[decora]

i propose to design a machine that when pointed at an object in a retail environment, will search a database and present to the user an interactive presentation about all the points on the supply chain that led to the object's existence on that retail shelf.

for example, the overnight wal-mart stockers with no health insurance, the long haul truckers who are continually pushed by managers to drive further with less sleep, the docks where TSA irradiates everything, the chinese factory where the manager rapes the workers on a regular basis, the government run prison mines that provide input to the factory, etc etc etc.

Re:Fine Print...

[dgatwood]

You do have the right to refuse such deals, you know. You can always tell Wal-Mart, "Sorry. We can't hit that price point without compromising quality, and we won't do that."

Wal-Mart might decide to drop your product, or they might not. If they don't, you've won. If they do, you can tell the world (on your website) that your products are no longer sold at Wal-Mart because they tried to force you to compromise on quality, and you said, "No". Then provide a list of alternative retailers that do carry your product. By so doing, you turn lost sales into increased customer loyalty.

Wal-Mart only screws businesses who are so desperate for Wal-Mart to carry their products that they will compromise their integrity just to stay on their shelves. If you ask me, the fault lies equally with both parties. Just saying.