Blog

IT’S TIME TO TWEET

My 10-Step “Twitter Bootcamp” Gets You Ready for Free Speech Under Elon Musk’s Ownership Now that Twitter is owned by someone who seems to like both freedom and capitalism, it’s time for everyone reading these words to reconsider Twitter. Like you, I skipped all the MySpace, TikTok, SnapChat fads, and for years skipped Twitter as just another apparent waste of time with a silly name that I couldn’t take seriously.  (I’m still not an Instagram user, nor Pinterest, and never got any benefit out of LinkedIn from the very early years).  But let’s get one  [...]

By Ben Langlotz | May 6, 2022 | Opinion Pieces | 0 Comments Read More »

LET’S GO BRANDIN’!

How to Pick Trademarks That Help You Sell, and Won’t Get You Sued. One of the most fun parts of my law practice is helping clients pick trademarks.  I don’t charge extra if I come up with an idea you love enough to use on a new product, or for your new company.  I always promise that some day when my portfolio of successful brand picks is impressive enough, I’ll put a fat price-tag on the service (pay only if you actually adopt one of my suggestions).  But then the pressure would be on, and the fun might end. I’ve written about branding before, and urged  [...]

By Ben Langlotz | April 14, 2022 | Firearms, Intellectual Property Advice, Trademark | 0 Comments Read More »

HOW TO GET TOP DOLLAR FOR YOUR COMPANY IN FIVE YEARS

Sometimes, I know when clients have been reading this newsletter.  Sometimes, I’m blown away to see something I wrote about years ago drive a client’s strategy. I just took a call from a client who told me they were getting ready to sell their company, and could we see about resurrecting some old trademark registrations they had earlier decided to let drop to save the renewal cost.  YOU see, they knew that a fatter portfolio of intellectual property would strengthen their case for a high valuation of their company beyond annual profits and hard assets.  Here’s  [...]

By Ben Langlotz | March 15, 2022 | Firearms Industry Advice, Intellectual Property Advice, Patent, Trademark | 0 Comments Read More »

THE ROYALTY DREAM

(How to License Your Inventions) Reality Check: The Bubble I’ve Busted a Thousand Times The classic newbie inventor has a good idea, falls in love with it, and wants to sell it to a big company.  That NEVER happens, almost.  Here’s what I counsel clients a dozen times a year: your odds of success increase vastly the farther along you are with your invention, your patent, your product, and your profits.  I’ll probably expand this to a full newsletter article, but for now, here is the hierarchy that determines how likely it is you can sell your rights (or  [...]

By Ben Langlotz | February 3, 2022 | Firearms | 0 Comments Read More »

LEAVING LAS VEGAS

The future of the SHOT Show I’m not going.  I just decided.  For the first time in more than 20 years, I’ll miss a SHOT Show. I’m skipping because of the mask mandate, pure and simple.  As you have read in prior months, I was an optimist that our firearms industry culture is on the free-thinking side and not too trusting of governments, especially those dominated by politicians who want to take our guns.  NASGW proved me right, and I trumpeted it in this space. But last week beginning Thursday (less than 2 weeks before SHOT), there was a weird shift.  The  [...]

By Ben Langlotz | January 11, 2022 | Firearms, Opinion Pieces | 0 Comments Read More »

THE SWEET SPOT FOR SUCCESS IN OUR INDUSTRY?

Selling Pistols like Soda Pop – Andy Warhol-style? It’s rare to find something on the Internet that gives you a new perspective on one of the most important aspects of your own life. We usually are seeing things that either enrage us, or reinforce what we already believe. Thankfully, I got permission from the author of this Substack publication to share it with you in its entirety, (along with my commentary). Open Source Defense bills themselves as “100% gun rights, 0% culture war. Making people proud to be associated with gun rights, with friendly,  [...]

By Ben Langlotz | December 4, 2021 | Firearms | 0 Comments Read More »