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MAGIC SHOP FOR SALE: Complete with inventory including Guillotine, Disembodied Princess, Sword Box and other effects. Price: $995.00. Too good to be true? No, loyal readers, it's better! The shop is a wonderfully detailed miniature built on a one inch equals one foot scale. The shop - a complete building, really - looks like Abbotts circa 1945. Although I've only seen the project via a set of color photographs, it is obvious that this is a collector's gem. If you are seriously interested, contact the shop's creator: Bob Moats, 6144 Lapeer Rd., Goodells, Ml. 48027. The shelves and display cases hold exact miniatures of a card duck, tipsy turvy bottles, zombie, die box, spider web card effect, rising cards, dove pan and much more. I only wish I had a spot for this 11" x 18" x 30" one-of-a-kind item.
Youthful Walter Stearns of Chicago sent an interesting letter recently with some thought provoking questions. Walter has invented some effects that he'd like to share with other magicians. His concern is that he doesn't want to give them away or have someone steal his ideas for manufacturing purposes.
What are Walter's options? Can he
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sell his idea to Abbotts or another dealer? Sure, but magic dealers are not the richest people I've ever met so the money a typical dealer would pay for an idea to manufacture is probably considerably less than what Walter will need to retire on. How many Bang Up Surprises does Abbotts sell per year? I don't know but surely not enough to afford a fat fee to its inventor. We must realize that very few magic tricks are sold in enough quantity to warrant mass production. I suppose literally hundreds of sets of Linking Rings are sold but there are many manufacturers of them and nobody is getting any royalties for inventing them.
Abbotts most popular item (i.e., the number one seller) is the original Abbott effect: SQUASH. It holds the #1 position because it has been sold, continuously, for over fifty years. Most other "best sellers" come and go. It's an exception when a trick like Super Needled Balloon comes out - sells well - and continues to do well.
Walter can sell his concept to a dealer and the dealer will produce the prop. Generally, the inventor is paid a fee for the item (often paid in a merchandise certificate). Or,
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