I guess one of the things that galls me most about what has happened is that they have copied my photos and are using them to sell a product that I worked so hard to develop. As other threads here state, it doesn't make any sense to pursue this legally. But, here is an idea that might be worthwhile, I will let each of you decide for yourself. I have complained to eBay. They have a section (VERO) that investigates and acts on copyright violations. I've executed an affadavit, under penalty of perjury that the photos being used by pricebusterchris (he is an employee of Chasis Tech who is now selling the grills) are my photos. Chasis Tech is a big vendor on eBay so I don't know if they will do anything. I have gotten a fair number of e-mails from people wanting to know what is going on with my photos being used by someone else. If someone wanted to, they could write a note to eBay at vero@ebay.com, commenting on "pricebusterchris" using the photos from www.crossfiregrills.com. Each of us uses eBay so I think we are entitled to let them know what we think. At least it seems that way to me. I will let you decide for yourself.

 

Don,
I went to ebay and found the a-hole that stole your business and typed the following message into the "ask the seller a question" field and then sent it to him.

Message sent:
So why did you screw over Don and take over selling grills directly and stop providing them to him to sell to his customers? I will be spreading the word to all Crossfire owners in the various forums online:

DO NOT BUY THIS PRODUCT FROM YOUR STORE.

I encourage everyone here in our forum to send this ***** a message regarding his poor business ethics.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...m=370001530328

 

Hate mail sent...

With precious few people doing any development work for new items for our cars, I hate seeing the few who are getting screwed. That's just wrong! We support you don!

 

Don - Sorry to hear about this. Sent e-mail to the jerk.

 

Did it !!! hope it helps,

 

Done!

This is about as sleazy as one can get.

Dear sirs,

I wanted to let you know that one of your sellers (pricebusterchris) is using photos and engineering developed by someone else ( www.crossfiregrills.com ) to sell products on eBay that were not his to exploit and without permission of the designer. Please do something about this.


Max Cichon
Engineer Associate
Auburn University
102 Leach Science Center
Auburn, AL 36849
334/844-6903 (Lab)
334/844-6902 (FAX)
cichon@physics.auburn.edu

 

I also sent an e-mail. Stuff like this is just ridiculous but not uncommon among eBayers. Next time you just have to put a watermark on your image.

 

Hate mail sent to sleazy vendor and a complaint sent to Ebay.

 

I dropped a note to E-Bay as follows. I hope this helps.


Your seller "pricebusterchris" is using the photos and selling grills from www.crossfiregrills.com. without their permission.

Don of crossfiregrills.com designed, marketed and developed an exclusive grill design for Chrysler Crossfire owners. He provided the users of crossfireforum.net with a development diary as he progressed in forming his new business.
He engaged the services of a fabricator ("pricebusterchris" was, or is an employee of the fabricator)to produce these grills to be placed for sale exclusively by crossfiregrills.com. Apparently when this unscrupulous individual (or company) saw the demand for the grills, he made it almost impossible for the original designer to purchase them for sale, stole the photos and used them on E-Bay and is now selling these grilles on E-Bay.
As a long, long-term user of E-Bay, I am demanding that you suspend this user as E-Bay has a reputation to maintain and this type of unethical seller does not warrant exposure to your faithful users.

Please respond back to me as to what actions E-Bay plans to undertake to prevent this fraud.

cwffwc

 

Well put!

 

A note of clarification. I can't claim ownership of the grill. That is ambiguous. I worked with them and guided the development of a grill they had earlier developed that did not fit well. There were no drawings or dimensions done, we simply modified and eventually got the fit we wanted. The verbal understanding we had was that I would have the right to market exclusively, then he started increasing the prices. In a very short time, he increased my prices to about what he is now charging to sell the grill to the public. I don't think I have any basis to try to restrict his sale of the grills, but I DO OBJECT TO HIM USING MY COPYRIGHGTED PHOTOS TO MARKET THE GRILLS. I can't believe that eBay has not even responded to my complaint regarding this.

 

I talked directly with K---y there and suggested he change the design and that the same photos are already being used on the Forum!
Sorry to hear this!
I suggest no Forum members buy from him!

A man is only as good as his word!!

 

I am currently getting crap from this guy on my email as I called him on his actions this very morning. I will post his responses soon.

 

I just sent my "question" to pricebusterchris through ebay.

"I was thinking of buying a grill for my Crossfire but since you made it impossible for Don of Crossfiregrills.com to sell them I won't be buying one from you. Oh, and the pictures look familiar too. You should take your own instead of ripping off someone else's. pricebuster chris is known as scumbagchris to everyone on crossfireforum, the largest group of crossfire owners AND your target group."

Happy to help!!

 

Thanks for all the support your have shown. From here on, I'm going to move forward in my efforts to develop a new grill. I met with a very capable fabricator today and he told me some things about the options that will work on the Crossfire. I am going to pursue that and will keep you informed. I have submitted my protest in detail to eBay and if they respond, fine, if not I have better things to do with my time. Thanks again, I appreciate all you have tried to do.

 

well i put my 2 cents in to him on ebay.

 

Don, You sound like a very sincere, trusting soul and have a good business sense.

I hope you do not mind my 2 cents, but, I too was a business owner. I found that you can trust people, but have a good attorney backing you up, helping you to protect your interests by getting agreements with business partners IN WRITING in the form of a contract with favorable terms for yourself.

I want to be a customer of yours, but I can't if you no longer have a business due to not protecting your business and yourself from the unscrupulous sc**bags that are out there.

Good luck to you and don't let the bast**ds grind you down.

 

You are of course right about getting things in writing. I have been a CEO, owned my own consulting business, etc. And, on one occasion when a managing partner got his hand stuck in the till I went to court. I got out of that OK, but not because of what the court did. Everything there was in writing and it was only pressure that we brought to bear in other ways that got the results. Even if I had this all in writing, I wouldn't pursue it legally, considering the dollars involved here. I have learned that unless a business deal works for both parties you might as well hang it up. It doesn't work to try and hold someone to something if they don't want to be there. This guy turned out to have less than ideal ethics, if that is the case, in writing or not, there is a problem. In my view, probably the biggest mistake I make was not checking the owner out carefully. But, the difficulty there is that I am not working in the industry and don't have the right contacts. So, I decided to take a chance knowing that it might not work out, and guess what it didn't.

 

Sent message to A$$hole.

 

Don Dixon didn't design or develop this grill nor does he have any type of copyright. Chassis Tech designed, developed and has been manfacturing these grills since december 15, 2006. If anyone would like to see this paper work trail i will be glad to email it. Don simply placed an order with us 2 months ago and was too impatient to wait for us to locate our fixture THAT WAS MADE IN DECEMBER OF '06 so we had him bring his car in and we made them and put them on his car at which time he stated he wanted to sell them on his CROSSFIRE FORUM. Don found this grill on our site airbagit.com and came to us with the picture he printed off our site wanting to purchase it. We are sorry he dooped everyone here in this forum into thinking that we've wronged him when infact with his false representations and accusations towards us on here and to ebay has caused the loss of orders which ebay lifted the hold on the orders after investigating and finding that Don was infact just one of our customers. Everyone on this forum has only heard his side of his story which is not true. Some of you have sent e-mails to us bashing us and even calling Chris names all based on Dons misrepresentation. We are in the process of pursuing this legally and if any of you would still like these grills we will give them to you at the price we were SELLING them to him $429 for the upper and the 2 lowers. 480-668-5448 ask for Chris and mention this forum to get the special price other wise normal retail is $628 for upper and lowers. We have been manufacturing quality auto aftermarket parts for 22 years now and have had people try to pull this before to no avail...thanks for your time.