Article: Coping With Clients Who Use Your Concept Design Without Paying [Archive]

morea

02-20-2006, 08:23 PM

A great blog from Pariah S. Burke of Designorati:

http://designorati.com/articles/t1/graphic-design/654/coping-%20with-clients-who-use-your-concept-design-without-paying.php

"A client has taken your concept design and hired someone else to execute it for less money. The client is reaping the benefits of your talent and skill, but you’re still eating generic mac n’ cheese. What recourse do you have?"

It is a must read!

morea

02-20-2006, 08:30 PM

another good read:

Educate Lowballers and Stop Lowballing
(from our sister site, the creative forum)

http://thecreativeforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=155

Navian

02-20-2006, 08:47 PM

Watermarks with a date stamp in them are wonderful things. :)

*EDIT*
OR you can put this at the bottom (small) of every page for concepts:

NOTICE: THE DESIGNS SHOWN AND DESCRIBED HEREIN INCLUDING ALL TECHNICAL DRAWINGS, GRAPHICS AND MODELS THEREIN ARE PROPRIETARY AND CANNOT BE COPIED, DUPLICATED OR COMMERCIALLY EXPLOITED, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, WITHOUT THE EXPRESS WRITTEN PERMISSION OF [insert your company name]. AVAILABLE FOR LIMITED REVIEW AND EVALUATION BY CLIENTS, CONSULTANTS, CONTRACTORS, GOVERNMENT AGENCIES, VENDORS AND OFFICE PERSONNEL ONLY IN ACCORDANCE WITH THIS NOTICE.

We have this ^ on our drawings.

morea

02-20-2006, 08:49 PM

seriously, this article should be read in its entirety and bookmarked in case you ever need to refer to it. It is incredibly well written and straightforward and offers professional ways to stand up for your rights.

Navian

02-20-2006, 08:53 PM

I'm reading it, and I'll print it out for class on Wednesday (business and marketing for graphic design).

morea

02-20-2006, 08:53 PM

excellent!

Patrick Shannon

02-20-2006, 09:00 PM

Good links....I especially like that picture they used with the first article.

morea

02-20-2006, 09:02 PM

yeah, that was a classic! :D

PersonasBinar

02-20-2006, 09:04 PM

where's the paragraph about chasing and beating? lol

morea

02-20-2006, 09:05 PM

it's implied, I think. :p

reuber1

02-20-2006, 09:09 PM

Defeated by the unassailable fortress of deliberate ignorance, you thank the client and hang up.Bookmarked.

flutterby nut

02-20-2006, 10:10 PM

morea...the designorati article is choice read...looks like a choice site too...now i'm off to read the other one you posted...lol...thanks so much...this is very helpful!

Gillis Media

03-03-2006, 06:20 PM

As part of the services I offer, I make signs. I recently made a "coming soon" banner for a local resturant, and was lined up to work on their logo and do signs, menus, etc. the project went cold & I was busy with other work. A couple of months later my girlfriend came home and told me that the resturant had used my banner design as their logo. the banner was nothing special, but was one of a series of designs that I use as "standards". But I know my rights, what they had done was steal my intellectual property. Any design set in any medium, is your "original work of authorship" and is protected by law. So I sent them a strongly worded letter informing them that they had indeed used my design with out my permission, and they owed me my design fee or would have to face court action. they paid.
Know your rights & always include on any sketch or proposed design that the design is yours and giving them a copy is in no way implying that they have any right to it. And if they use it, take them to court, you will have an easy time proving that you own the design, and they will have to pay.

morea

03-03-2006, 06:22 PM

Well done. Thank you for sharing your experience, and welcome to the forum!

panzer

04-05-2006, 03:49 PM

reuber1

04-05-2006, 03:52 PM

It's the difference between ownage rights and usage rights. Very much like the photography world.

morea

04-05-2006, 03:53 PM

that sounds like a question about copyright infringement... and I am not terribly well versed in that subject. It would probably depend on what was included in your contract and what the laws are in your area. In that case, I would think the best thing to do would be to consult an attorney.

04-05-2006, 03:57 PM

You can't copyright a concept though… right?

Thats more like ethics- they will burn in hell,lol.

morea

04-05-2006, 04:11 PM

There you go, that's a good answer. ;)

mac.FINN

04-10-2006, 10:01 PM

YAY, this just happened to me! I'm glad I read this a while ago :D

Sanjana

04-11-2006, 10:50 PM

Hey something similar happened to me too.

I was freelancing for one of the big tea making companies. Had finished designing packaging for one of their premium products. And was breaking my head creating new identity for them.

The owner’s wife wanted me to help her design a wedding invitation card for someone (Not paid of course!!) Which she wanted printed and ready in 5 days!!!

( Oh in my country Wedding Invites are a BIG thing.. everything has to be exclusive)

Politely I told her that I won’t be able to as I was too busy with other projects. But I offered to show her few of the good examples that I had.

One of them was a card designed by me for my sister’s wedding. I clearly told her not to create anything similar to that as only wish of my sister was that her wedding card should be totally different than anything that we have ever seen till date. And my design had surely matched that brief!! Even after the marriage we kept getting calls telling how beautiful and exclusive the invitation card was.

So I took a few cards to her the next day. She said ‘she was busy and so why don’t I leave them behind so that she could go through them later’.

I dint have very good feeling about that but still I did so.

That evening I fell sick for about a week. And so my next visit to that office happened only after 20 days. After the work was done I went to meet their in-house designers, who are my friends too. There, one of the junior designers showed me the latest work he had to do…. Which was COPING MY CARD!!!

It had the same concept, colours and layout as the card designed by me!!
The only thing which was changed was that, there were no floral graphics but just the empty colour patches. And that too was just because the designer who copied my work would have taken at least two days to reproduce the graphics!!

Ohh I was so furious ….. I just left that place.

But I still feel frustrated cause I dint say anything to that bitch!!

This whole issue was about ethics …. I was just helping and this is what I got in return!!!

orkaknos12

04-12-2006, 03:29 AM

panzer

05-09-2006, 02:45 PM

i feel ill

maemae

12-12-2006, 05:31 PM

Thank you for posting this article! I appreciate it!
~Mae

bejamshi

02-20-2007, 04:17 PM

moreover.. did anyone notice this site in the article.. I thought it was a joke, but it's not? http://GetAFreelancer.com? read this site and see how low people go for the all mighty dollar ...breaks my heart .. it's pure exploitation.

-Jon I just get worried if the designs they do is original or they copy copyright material since they live in foreign countries.

vaughn

02-21-2007, 02:53 PM

Sue them.

bejamshi

02-21-2007, 02:54 PM

Sue them. You can not sue them if they don't live in canada or the states. many countries are using copyright material all the time. I will not name the countries but they are many.

bejamshi

02-21-2007, 02:58 PM

Never leave any of your work with anyone. Never.
I don't care if the job is worth millions. Make sure you charge them good for the tea design your doing.

budafist

02-21-2007, 08:46 PM

Slap them with a wet fish.

bejamshi

02-21-2007, 08:49 PM

Slap them with a wet fish.:eek::rolleyes::p:D

budafist

02-21-2007, 09:48 PM

I’m quite skilled with a sewing machine and pattern, but that doesn’t grant me the talent, skill, or right to call myself a fashion designer.

So true in the design world. Just because you can use the program, doesn't mean you have design skills.

creative 3d

04-08-2007, 07:50 PM

"It's unwise to pay too much, but it's worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money - that is all.

When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The common law of business balance prohibits paying a little and getting a lot -it can't be done.

IF YOU DEAL WITH THE LOWEST BIDDER, IT IS WELL TO ADD SOMETHING FOR THE RISK YOU RUN and if you do that, you will have enough to pay for something better."

Wise Words....

mooseman

09-21-2007, 02:14 PM

Im NOT defending them, but I will say I've worked in companies that the owners/managers making the decision to re-purpose some artwork that someone did into something else, just dont know any better.

I've seen some that do, but most are just ignorant with no idea of the whole copyright process. They figure, its their logo, so anything you do with it must be theirs.

Ive had to explain it many time to people like that.

mchilly

09-24-2007, 03:51 AM

budafist

09-24-2007, 03:58 AM

Yeah I agree too. I love a good bargain, but sometimes I end up buying a product that doesn't work at all. In those cases, I might as well has chucked my money into the toilet. It's a fine line between a good deal and buying a piece of junk.

jimmiecat

10-24-2007, 07:26 PM

I had a "friend" do that to me. I pitched 3 ideas for a pc design, one was chosen, designed, printed. After a few months of being busy, we naturally grew apart, I then saw one of my other pitches, made of 72dpi images from her site, and photocopied to quarter page. I couldn't believe I atleast wasn't asked if it was ok. LOL. I got the final laugh though because it looked awful!

Blak_Phoenix

10-30-2007, 10:57 AM

Great article, can anyone email me the document he has at the bottom, i cant seem to download it.

Big Gabe

04-08-2008, 11:15 PM

Slap them with a wet fish.
dirty fish slapper!!!

Cooper

04-12-2008, 12:39 PM

morea a question

what if we design say a leaflet or some one and (we print it ) then later on they get some one else to do a leaflet that is nearly 90% the same as we had given them in the past

the point is if they paid for it isnt it now fully theirs
Not necessarily. Unless your contract stipulated that the price includes transferal of all rights including the right to alter the artwork then they are in breach of copyright.

Copyright includes the prevention of altering existing artwork. Now, even if they recreate the artwork from scratch, if it's still provably derivative of your original piece, you can go after them. 90% similiar would be fair game, I believe, although you'd have to convince a judge of the degree of similarity.

You can not sue them if they don't live in canada or the states. many countries are using copyright material all the time. I will not name the countries but they are many.

Only half true. Any designer working in a country that signed up for the Bern Convention for the Protection of Copyrights (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berne_Convention_for_the_Protection_of_Literary_an d_Artistic_Works) is likely to be fair game for sueing. As you can see from the map on that article, very few countries are excluded.

Emily0415

06-13-2008, 10:00 AM

Though I am not familiar with technical terms, I still should it is a great work.

BGTOHH

08-13-2008, 11:28 AM

Hi everyone-I am new to this forum. and the reason I ended up here is because I googled for designer forum to see if anyone has been in the same situation as me. This article could not be more dead on. this is exactly what i am dealing with right now (or better yet: WAS dealing with yesterday! Coz I am walking away from the whole thing).

I was employed in design industry for 10 years. I have dealt with many clients during that time - through company and also through some freelance jobs on the side. 2 months ago i have relocated to a new country and i am not employed at the moment, so i thought I would try and make some money through some freelance work. I've gone online, looking for projects - bid on couple of them. And one of the 'potential clients' came back to me asking me to supply him with couple of proposals - all of this while the project is still in bidding phase (project, BTW, is for the company logo). I nicely responded to him, explaining that I can not do that due to the .... well: facts known to all of you guys who are designer (and points well covered in the article posted). I provided him with few of the work samples and explained to him that my abilities as a designer can be seen in the samples I sent him. He didn't like that I guess, because his response to that was: Well, how will I know you will give me quality work?
So I decided to just not even respond to that - I am not the only person who bid on this project and if some of the other designers are willing to spend couple of hours doing free work, so be it. I am not ready to undersell myself, the same way I am not ready to bid $50 for creating a corporate logo for someone.

I am happy to see .... well, this doesn't sound right and I don't mean it in a bad way ... I am glad to see that i am not the only one who is dealing with this problem.

artgem1984

11-27-2008, 04:34 PM

We recently had a bit of a dodgy do with a customer of ours (we are a print company with a graphic design dept.). Essentially, our wally of a sales director made one of us do some 'spec' work - design new logos for this company for free til they found one they liked. WELL, after taking the designs away and not coming back to us at all about it (and this is a company we do a lot of work for), the guy who did the work saw a van go past one day with....dum dum dum! One of the logos he'd designed on it. They'd taken them away, then gone to a 'marketing' company, got them to recreate then put this logo on a load of new business stationary, and i had a look on this company's site - they are claiming the 'rebrand' was done by them and have it in their online portfolio. C***S. Plus - get this - we have a job in for the 'rebranded' company - to set the new letterhead here using a photocopy of the marketing company's design. WTF?????!!!!!!! Especially seeing as they've been in touch with the marketing company to get the logo from them, in order for us to reset it. Hello? Why not get the file for the letterhead while you're at it.... once again C***S.

Nick Awkward

12-03-2008, 12:13 PM

I think it is the most shameful thing a client can do. I totally agree, this article is a must read.

emerson

12-03-2008, 02:31 PM

I don't know if it works in today's market, but.....
about 10 or 15 years ago, I was sitting next to a lawyer in a pub and started talking to him about this specific issue. He told me to try and use what is called "the poor man's copyright." Basically, before you hand over proofs to a client, mail a copy of those proofs to yourself and keep it sealed. That way there is an official dated stamp of the proofs, so if it comes to going to court that mail is considered a government sealed document, and the company who took advantage of you will have a hard time showing they had the work done before that specific date. He told me he helped a client with a case like this and ended up getting his client a lot more money than what the original job was suppose to be.

emerson

12-03-2008, 02:48 PM

Sorry for the double post. I was looking for an example online after I wrote the above post and from what I have found out, the "Poor man's copyright" is not such a great idea, apparently it is to easily manipulated these days. They should come out with some kind of law that would help protect us creatives. I don't think that every time you create something for a company you should have to go through the red tape of copyrighting, plus the additional costs. As a Graphic Designer it seems it would be hard to copyright a name that a client already owns, but you need to make a logo for. I wonder how you go about fixing that particular problem.

Pointyhat

12-03-2008, 03:00 PM

Another way to cover your butt, is to mail yourself any finished logos, designs, etc but don't open. The postmark proves your time lines etc. (I'm in the US)

Virgo Nightingale

12-03-2008, 03:11 PM

synthetik

12-03-2008, 08:35 PM

this sucks..why would someone want to steal someone else's work?

not that it doesn't happen...it happened to me in college

Pointyhat

12-03-2008, 08:52 PM

^^^WARNING: THIS DOES NOT HOLD UP IN COURT ANYMORE.

There have been too many cases of fraud using this method to 'copyright' things, so it's no longer accepted as valid.

http://www.copyrightauthority.com/poor-mans-copyright/

Hadn't heard that. I dunno, the guy's not a lawyer and usually the P.O. won't mail open letters. But who knows. I have a few, I'm sure I'll never have to use them. I guess you could use registered mail. I just make sure I get paid for everything I do. What they do with it then, I don't care.

Virgo Nightingale

12-03-2008, 08:56 PM

I remember hearing of a case where someone was in cahoots with a postal worker, paying him to postmark his mailings with an old date so their 'work' would magically predate something that was already out. It was this case in particular I believe, along with the other fraudulent methods, that makes the court weary of awarding damages in such a case.

Probably wouldn't hurt your case to use it, but never ever rely on it as a sole means of proving your copyright. If you're that concerned about your work getting stolen, get it properly copyrighted. ;)

RedKitchGrl

01-14-2009, 11:07 PM

Once I had a job interview for a full-time position. The woman wanted me to design 3 specs as part of the interview. I said, wait do you want freelance because that's what you're asking for. She either didn't get it, or pretended not to. I said I don't do work for free; she claimed it was part of the interview process and if I didn't participate I would'nt be considered for the job. I said ok and left. Later I submitted some watermarked art but never heard back. Felt really crappy that I didn't stick to my guns.

Another time I interviewed at a printshop that wanted to "test" my skills. This was back when Adobe first came out with Illustrator88. So I created a circuit board and a map. Turns out it was a job from one of their clients and I just worked for free. I didn't find this out until they interviewed another guy, then the owner laughed about how they got this work done for free. That's ok, though. When it was slow we played a lot of tetris and still billed our hours.

I refuse to work for free and for spec. Eff that. After you've been bent over too many times, you finally learn. Well, I did at least.

izziart

03-04-2009, 05:51 PM

Yes, chasing and beating for sure.... Good luck with trying to keep up with this once you start designing. My experience has been to get the money up front and keep trucking. Court costs and knee-breakers all cost time, money and supreme aggravation. THAT IS WHY, in my humble opinion, IF THE ''BIG GUYS'' get ripped off, there is hell to pay. For instance, photographers have big foots they use to squash people that misuse their photos. I don't work on a budget like that. But this is just the ''street talk'' on proprietary design. Mostly I just have my clients sign off on stuff and leave a paper trail before ''the trial'' starts and if it ever became a blatant misuse, I'd be that much ahead in being prepared for court. Honestly, if we didn't love what we do so much, we surely wouldn't put up with a lot of this nonesense.

Eddiemx

06-11-2009, 05:38 PM

baseball bat to the kneecaps, thats how u deal w this type of client.

izziart

06-11-2009, 11:01 PM

haha - I wholeheartedly agree and figuratively speaking, it was done. I think my ''reputation'' now sits with other local designers that if they are rejected by my studio, the potential client will be charged triple for the "pita" factor.... so in a way, I am helping other area designers!

Say I just got one today that said we could "partner" -- I build the website, maintain it, host it, and market it; and when they sell something, we can split the profits! -- Wow! A new bumper crop of "What planet are you from" clientele on the horizon!