This weekend was spent scouring the USPTO website for a patent that is already held by another individual. I am trying to get the design information so I can alter it juuuuuuust enough to call it my own.

After hours of searching, I find that some bastard has actually already come up with the thing I would like to do... in a cheapened, crappy design. My biggest problem is that I haven't figured out the ideal format in which to produce a quality, collector's level product. I can tell you exactly why this guy chose to create the cheapest thing possible; the combination of product construction & advertising costs combined with the product start to get to be astronomical.

My question is, if the product is designed at a level of quality that it would be perceived as a collector's item, will folks with bigger budgets be willing to help out the little guy by purchasing more advertising space and allow for smaller budgets to buy less and therefore, be more rare than the bigger budgets? Is that fair?

Not sure...

Labels: advertising, business, design, development