INVENTING 101
Your Profit Formula
As a general rule, a product needs to be manufactured for 25 percent of its expected price to consumers to make money. This is due to distribution and selling costs. That means that your manufacturing costs must be less than 50 cents if your product’s retail price is $2.
Understanding Improvement Patents
With an improvement patent, you add improvements to a previously patented invention. If you are not the owner of the previous patent, you might be able to get a patent but not be able to sell the product related to the patent because you would be infringing on the original patent.
Think Like a Licensee
Companies always want a margin of at least 50 percent. You need to have a good grasp of the percentage of the retail price the company receives to address this issue. Understand and leverage these 4 main deal-making factors for your potential partners.
Finding Opportunities
Even in winning categories, some products are better than others. Here are some ways to help you to a winning formula. These principles apply across the board—whether you are looking to produce your own product, license it to a manufacturer, or strike a joint venture deal of some kind.
Target Market Tutorial
Use these simple steps and questions to make the right contacts. Explore our tips for inventors to start conversations with potential contacts in their target market.
The Path to Easy Sales
Before investing too much money in an invention, it pays to consider how easy it will be to sell. Let’s look at this from two major themes—priorities for customers, and your ability to get and retain them through entry points.