Intertap beer faucets

Oh I understand what your saying And I see your point but the truth is its is a common issue when you contract chinese suppliers to make things in your name. It looks like youhave a situation were that employee did something he should legally be accountable for in this case but im kinda shocked it was allowed to go on for a couple years without anyone else at the company catching on? I mean anyone who worked for kegking would have noticed these websites such as Williams selling these pretty early on right? I mean how can kegland legally even operate now selling your products and using your name? even the website is keg king and not keg land? it seems like there was some sort of legal split in the company for this to be allowed? it just seems really odd that a random employee could do all this and get away with it is all.

I once bought an upconverting dvd player that was sold directly by the manufacturer without the company whos branding was on the boxes involvement... I didnt know it at the time and jumped on it because was only $120 vs $350 which they previously sold for... The company actually discontinued the model product and sued the supplier over it and theres was quite a thread over at AVS forum about it not much unlike this one. They all had a major issue with the power supply capacitors failing and apparently the company whos brand was on it got out of honering the warranty on all of them because they couldnt effectively distinguish the real ones from the ones sold direct from the supplier because they gave too much control to the supplier as far as documentation and packaging right down to serial numbers and distributors.

 

So, from all of that, my take-away is "it's the exact same product from the same manufacturer". I understand there are clear business issues involved but I don't see any disassociation from whatever qualities are in the product. Whether sold through one channel or another, it's the same faucet, apparently...

Cheers!

 

Keg King management at that time was not aware because two senior employees were in control of sales and procurement. It was only after a legal firm was called in to look at irregularities that it became obvious that Keg King products were being sold to the US out of a distribution centre in Shanghai. The Kegland name was registered by one of these people whilst still in the employ of Keg King. Kegland burst on to the scene after these people were removed from the business and is the subject of legal action from Keg King. Sadly it takes time fore this to go through the legal system but a judgement was obtained against Kegland in Australia last year forcing them to trial this year. However the court has no jurisdiction over what was done overseas in particular China. There was no legal split. The businesses in the US selling Keg King products were made aware of all this.

We cannot control what happened in China as the rules there are different. Our name and our logo was taken and registered by a Chinese person on behalf of a Chinese company that used to be a supplier to Keg King. It has caused us a lot of headaches and we even had to change our logo to avoid customs problems. Frankly it is a rather terrible situation when a business suddenly has to face that its trademarks, names and logos have been knocked off in another country. This was all done without the knowledge or consent of any kind by Keg King senior management. Happy to send you a copy of the supreme court judgement.

 

And here we arrive at the KegKing vs. KegLand battle that I eluded to. I'm sure KegLand has there own version of events.
And if you look hard enough, you'll find it...

My guess is that Williams and MoreBeer both carrying KegLand products is part of the reason they are not carrying the KegKing products. Since the EVABarrier tubing is not available at Northern Brewer, as it's a KegLand product. Nor is any other KegLand product as far as I know.

I'd be interested in the UltraFlo's once the interchangeable spouts are available (similar to the Intertap)

 

Kegland has the advantage of operating in the country were all the products are actually made by suppliers that chose to sell to kegland apparently with out exclusion contracts (which often expire after a while anyway) so I could see this being a sticky situation. I know they dont enforce in trademarks there. Ive heard the stories of the Buick clones made in china without GMs permission and Ive seen the fake apple store reports on the news... and we all see what happens over and over very often when something is made there for one company.. Especially when supply and demand is allowing these to be sold at high markups, soon everyone is selling clones (or the real thing) for less (30a nema plug based tri clamp versions of the ripple element for example) In some ways It can be argued that its capitalism at even a purer form than found here in the states.

 

We really don't want any involvement with anything Kegland. We just object to our name being used. If people want to buy stuff from unauthorised sources there is not much we can do. We just want people to know that even though it says Keg King on the box it is not our product if not bought from an authorised reseller.

 

I expect it's rather uncommon for folks to question a retailer as to whether they are "authorized" to sell a product.
Have you considered a corporate name change?

Cheers!

 

That is pretty hard to do but we are renaming a lot of products. Like the Fermentasaurus became the Fermenter King etc.

Hopefully through sites like this and other avenues we can make people aware. Kegland in Australia tried to have our case dismissed but they failed in this last June and have been ordered to stand trial in May this year.

 

This saga looks like a typical scenario; Company invents and markets product, decides to have product made in china to save money, product idea, design and even branding are stolen. It has happened countless times in almost every industry.

Maybe next time(if they get another chance or a new good idea) they will decide to make or have product made in country where intellectual property rights are enforceable.

 

lol except in the case of these taps its not even clear as to who invented them... Remember ventmatic took legal action as owning the patents to the design and is now getting or got paid for these...(At least the ones sold here in the states as far as I know)

I think I liked it better when a company designed and made their own products in house... you know the kind of industry this country was built on in the first place.. If you wanted to do well you built a better mousetrap and sold them at competitive rates.

 

Oh. You mean before MBAs?

 

Well China is getting a lot better and the demand from home brewers is always lower prices so whilst I like your thinking it would mean customers paying a lot more for their kit. Hard to have it both ways. Lets face it not a lot of what we use in everyday life is made in developed countries.

 

Well I’m confused....

I have a couple of intertap faucets I bought from Atlantic Brew Supply in Raleigh a year of or two ago. No idea if they are real or not. I would think so since I bought from large, established LBSH. But now I’m not so sure.

In any case they work great.

 

Even if I were to accept your premise that most home brewers are only conscious of price, China is not the only "less developed" country with a manufacturing base. There are others with more contractual respect for property rights, Indonesia comes to mind, and they are not the only one.

My point was if it were me, I would not hand over my ideas, specifications and technology to a factory in a country with an overt and government encouraged policy of intellectual property theft.

 

Like mentioned there are no "clones" They were all made in the same chinese factory except different people sold them under the same brand name and the main kegking in australia wasnt getting the proceds from the ones sold in the states. so they were legit products but not through legit middlemen whose name was used in marketing anyway.

Originally keg king australia had them made for australia and other countries ,not to be sold in the states... a couple employees apparently took it upon themselves to trademark the brand name in the US and start distributing them in the states and seller like Williams and atlantic as well as many others sold them here but supposedly this was not santioned by the real keg king company and they were not making any money off these sales and there fore should not have to support them as far as any warranty issues.. The people at kegking now went to a different manufacturer to make a new modified version of their taps and the old style are still being sold by Kegland if I have the story right...

 

Yet sooo many do... because prices are cheapest for labor in china... those taps likely cost kegking about $5-10 a piece wholesale...

Same thing happened with the Tri clamp based ripple heating elements a couple years ago... Brewboss had them designed and made in china... brewboss and brewhardware sell them for $75 plus shipping each... I start seeing pictures of them on alibaba stating they start at $9 each depending on quantity ordered... I order 2 samples for $16 each plus shipping... report my finding here and am basically told im lying about what I paid and then later im told they are dangerous and inferior... fast forward and its now known 2 companies make these in china (Dernold and Yuling) and they can be bought all over including ebay and from members here that decided to import them in quantities and resell themselves for a proifit while still being less, without going through the original american company that originally came up with the idea to take the chinese camco element clones and mount them directly in drilled out 1.5 and 2"tri clamp cap with a 30 amp plug end attached... up until this point people were using screw in TC based adapters with cords attached to them which actually raised production cost.

Now if the element had not sold so well at such a markup we would likely not have seen the other sellers and brands popping up from china. at least not so quickly... look at the grainfather and all the copycats including the new chinese blichmann version... you can find most of those on alibaba too.


Hell I bought my whole 3bbl kettle system directly from the company stout uses to make them for literally about HALF the price including customs and shipping.... This tells me stouts markups are pretty good and explains why they continue to use that manufacturer despite them marketing and selling direct themselves in the same country. The big difference here is that company doesnt use stouts brand name..

 

Nor did they likely develop the product or the design. They merely copy to the specs got from paying client, and the client paid, (one way or another) for the tooling up to make the product.

They just crank some out after or in between contract batches and sell tough their local channels at a fraction of price.

In some cases, there is less recourse if buyer has a problem, but seems to be working for you.....

 

Its possible.. or its possible its the other way around or a combination of both. But they sell direct at many places including sungoodmachinery.com and they make and sell much more brewing equipment that stout doesnt sell so.. (Also not all stouts stuff is made by them either). They are also a sponsor of the nano equipment section of the probrewer forum... Not your typical scenerio.. In fact Id venture to guess stout may have saw their products on alibaba as many distributors do because most of the stuff stout sells can be found on alibaba from different suppliers and are sold by different companies like affordable distilling for example some have miner design changes were were likely input from the original contracted company they are not supposed to use... This is the case for brewha and unibrau both using the same supplier for thier main conical kettle.

Not unlike the Malt munchier/kegco/ cerial killer/ northern brew/list goes on grain mills which you can order on alibaba with whatever laser etched branding and logo you want in the side with a bulk order.

If you think about it this is commonplace for autoparts and most dont have an issue buying an off brand from the same supplier that the same product from oem or other aftermarket store brands.. Sometimes the design is unique sometimes its not.

 

Brad Amidzich claims the invention of this type of forward sealing tap. We bought our rights from him.

 

Well I doubt that there is enough technology or expertise in Indonesia to make such a tap. Also it is a very difficult country to do business in. Have visited there a couple of times and came to the conclusion that there is no way we can do anything there. Vietnam on the other hand could have possibilities but they are not great on IP protection either.

 

Its not a modified version but a whole new design. Unlike the Intertap the Ultra Tap is a laminar flow tap (means less foam due to less turbulent flow).

 

Yes Ive read the long thread here a couple years ago... Ive also seen the drawings of other similar forward sealing taps before his..