Source
r/smallbusiness•
shittyCEO

Competitor Issues/Legal Advice?

Having some issues recently. Been in business awhile and have maybe a handful of competitors all whom know of each other.

The story: Someone left a bunch of generic shitty advertisements regarding new lucrative positions at their company on all my employee's cars in our parking lot, but didn't do it to any other business on our cul-de-sac.

Essentially the brochure to me looks like a scam, a generic @gmail e-mail address with no information about the company. The Ad basically stated EVERY position at our company which most people would never need. Basically niche Welders and tech people. I don't pay top dollar but we take care of our guys here so they all brought the brochures up to me.

I took it upon myself to investigate just to see who it was, I had a pretty good idea of 3 people off the top of my head: Owner of shit company #1 (OSC#1), a disgruntled employee, and an indirect competitor who was talking about merging last year.

I made a fake gmail, fake name, and fake google voice number and e-mailed them a generic message saying it's great opportunity and I'm interested. Fake guy will be called Jerry G.

Next day I get a call to my offices from a School District Number asking for Jerry G. I say "Yes he works here but he's in the back". They say they are calling from Wells Fargo but have them call me back and gave a fake phone number. Weird part is I never submitted anything to reveal what company I worked for so it looks like they just left those flyers at my company.

The only person who fits this description is OSC#1, his daughter works for him and works for the very same school district. So I'm pretty confident I have my finger pointing in the right direction. We compete over customer's and multiple customer's have told me directly that he bad mouths our company so my guess is he is trying to confirm is Jerry G. works here so he can show people that Employees from my company are jumping ship to his because times are bad or whatever bullshit he spins.

Do I have any legal options? They've been doing things like this for the past 3 years, this is roughly the 4th incident of something like this. I've let it go in the past, so have my partners, but this is coming at a rough time for us as my partners wife just got diagnosed with some terrible cancer. OSC#1 even bad mouthed my partner in January about picking up his phone while he's dealing with his wife's cancer...and I mistakenly lashed out at him in front of some customer's because of it.

From where I look I don't have any legal options besides a cease and desist letter which could maybe scare them. I've been documenting everything that's happened but I don't have any of the phone calls recorded I just write down the time/date/details and pictures of phone calls.

I would like to hear anyone who'e been through something like this before. I'm all for competition but this is pretty scummy. Next option for me is to unleash some of the bitcoin I have and spam the fuck out of him.

Obviously I'm overreacting a bit but I'm getting sick of this guy's shit.

Posted Mar 10, 2017, 10:16 PM UTC · edited

59
beley•

Let him spend all his time and energy on this BS. You continue to focus on your customers and treating your employees right. Let him stay distracted, you keep your focus on what's important. Do that, and its game, set, match.

5
shittyCEOOP•

Appreciate the response. I have been ignoring it but it's getting a little ridiculous now. I do understand not put to much effort into the thought.

1
SafetyMan35•

You have no firm evidence that he did it, and it appears that most if not all of your employees were loyal to you. Ignore it and take the time and energy you have spent trying to figure out how to respond to OSC and direct it to solidifying the foundation of your business and expansion.

2
madsci•

I'm just going to add to this that you should document everything, just in case. If that happened at my shop I'd save the security camera video of the person leaving the flyers, or check with my neighbors - we've helped each other out with security video a couple of times.

In my opinion, it doesn't hurt to spend a little bit of time thinking about what low blows a competitor like that might try, and preparing for them if there are easy things you can do. In this case it might mean talking to your employees about what OSC#1 is trying to pull.

The closest thing I've experienced was when someone placed a fake Craigslist ad pretending to be my company and advertising a blowout sale, apparently to hurt my reputation for not honoring it or at least to inconvenience me with a flood of inquiries.

I got the IP address it was posted from but didn't pursue it beyond figuring out what city it came from. Some time later I got an order from that city and on a whim I checked the credit card gateway. Lo and behold, the IP address matched.

That person happened to be a small business owner who was affiliated with a competitor that I'd butted heads with. I forwarded everything to my lawyer and he had me draft a cease and desist letter to put the person on notice. I haven't had any trouble since.

3
shittyCEOOP•

Thanks for sharing. That's all I have been doing since it first happened a few years back. Normally I am pretty calm but this situation is irking me to no end (which could be what he wants).

1
shittyCEOOP•

That's my point I have no firm evidence but he keeps harassing our company. I've put it behind me in the past but to JUST leave flyers at my place of business like that is taking it a little far to me.

I understand I shouldn't put as much focus as I am.

1
SafetyMan35•

He is leaving flyers and your employees are remaining loyal to you.

if you want, install some cameras outside or in the window of your business to see who is doing this. There is some webcam software that will take photos if it senses motion. Connect a standard webcam to a computer and set the camera up pointing outside and see what you get.

1
c_dawg7•

I'm struggling to see what he's actually done wrong? People try and poach staff all the time. If they brought it to your attention it's clear that no one is taking it seriously. Just keep on doing what you're doing. Clearly you're doing something right if he wants all your staff.

2
shittyCEOOP•

Well if you want all the details:

  1. 2009 when my product first came out he bashed it into the ground publicly on the various forums for our product (verified company account).

  2. After I had some success and start outselling him he makes a fake offer to buy out my company (his company has been around since the 60-70's). I give the idea some thought and he asks for a BUNCH of details regarding my company. I spoke with an indirect competitor and he did the same thing to him just to reveal a bunch of info eg. finances, BOM's, etc. He's proposed this atleast 10-20 times now and I tell him to fuck off politely every time.

  3. Bout 4-5 years after my product is having success, he blatantly copies my design, color scheme, and configuration of sections in our equipment. It looked like shit still but multiple customers forwarded me the e-mails when it came out which made me laugh.

  4. At our first trade show he would try to hang around the booth and confront customers which is where I snapped on him told him to fuck off. Got the trade show coordinators involved and they handled it for us.

  5. Same year at the trade show one of my guys forgets something at the booth and finds he and his engineer at our booth where magically all of our stuff was uncovered and he had a camera.

  6. Multiple reports from customers (who I'm friends with) and my reps that he bashes our company finances, etc..

  7. For some reason he sent credit reports to my business but it had all of my competitors names on it, but my address? He also used his name on all of the documents but forgot to change the address. So I got ~7 competitors credit info with his name on it but all to my address. That was weird.

Now we're here and still going.

I carry a lot of emotions in my businesses and worked hard to get here the right way. For some old fuck who had every opportunity to fine-tune is product but was complacent with the shit he's been putting out for 30 years and never made any changes to try and do back alley bullshit like this is going a little far in my eyes.

I've dealt with scumbags before but normally they are customers.

1