What's the Price-Match Guarantee?

Simple: If another legitimate dealer (one with a dedicated website - not eBay - and a listed phone contact ) is selling our products at a discount, we will match that price. Simply buy the product as listed on our website and send us a link to the other dealer's discounted item. We'll adjust your PayPal transaction to credit the difference.

Why do we no longer offer everyday discounts on our products?

Some dealers objected to our customer loyalty VIP discounts as unfair competition. So we made the changes. We will continue our pre-release discount offers via eMail.

Why do we offer items at pre-release discounts?

Lots of reasons.

First, doing so allows us to reward customer loyalty. Most of those who are pre-release customers have bought from us before. They are comfortable with our reputation, they appreciate our quality, and they want to be the first to enjoy the most current release.

Second, we use early sales as a test-marketing tool. We usually adjust our production order depending on the pre-release response - which keeps prices at a reasonable level.

Finally, we are employing a principle in entrepreneurship known as "O.P.M.". Other People's Money. It costs a small fortune to produce the quality products for which we're becoming known. As an example, Eye Candy's printing bill alone was in the high four figures. Borrowing the money from a bank becomes a cost of business to be passed on to customers through higher prices. Instead we offer customers a whopping discount on advance purchases, with those sales offsetting our production expenses. Everyone wins. And due to our product guarantee, they can't lose.

How do we set our retail selling prices?

We design and produce Mentalism and really don't want to schlep around in a warehouse, run to the post office, or hassle with accounts receivable. We aren't in the bean-counting business. That means we only wholesale our product to dealers we like, who respect our investment, and pay their bills. Everyone who touches the merchandise, from the distributor to the parcel delivery driver to the retail shop owner needs to make a profit to keep the doors open.

Let's work it in reverse. Say an item sells for $100. A standard retail margin is 40%. That means the dealer pays about $60, plus shipping. The wholesaler makes 25-33%, obviously getting much more enthusiastic about products which allow him a better markup. So backing another 33% out of the remaining $60 gets down to a 'jobber/distributor' price of $40. The difference between that amount and our total expenses is Mentalism Unlimited's profit. Experience has provided a rule-of-thumb formula which we apply to a potential product midway in the development phase when we have a good idea of what it's going to cost us to produce. After we apply the formula, we take a look at the resulting retail price and decide whether to continue. Unlike many others in this business, we don't fold in some imaginary value "for the secret". We simply calculate our selling price using a formula which allows for everyone in the chain of distribution to make a living and then round the figure to the nearest ten bucks.

Where do we get our ideas?

Out of thin air. Really. Sometimes an idea just 'shows up' in our heads and we get to work on it. More often, however, these are concepts that have been knocking around in our minds for ages - principles in search of a good presentation or sometimes a great routine idea in need of a method. Other products are variations on classics or our own personal performance material. At any given time we have up to a dozen potential products in various stages of development. Some take half a year to design (Double Vision) while others advance much more quickly. At every step in the process we challenge one another to get the most out of the item and bring our collective experiences to bear. When we're both happy with the result, we get to work on production.

Some of our product descriptions sound too good to be true.

Remember the guarantee? It helps keep us from getting carried away. Here's an open secret: Larry Becker spent his professional life as an owner/partner in a top-notch advertising agency and there is no one better at composing superb advertising copy. It's fascinating to see him engaged in the process. Lee Earle has worked as an entrepreneurial entertainer his entire life. He understands a professional performer's needs and 'tweaks' the copy to hit the high points. But regardless of their ways with words, if the products don't live up to expectations, a lot of returned packages will be waiting at the post office. So you can count on one thing - the only reason the ads sizzle is because we're serving steak - not chopped liver.

I have a great idea for a product. Are you interested?

Yes. But don't expect to make a fortune if it turns out to be something we can work with. We don't have the inclination to manage royalties, percentages, or residuals but instead purchase all rights to an item for a lump sum amount and reserve the option to alter, change, adjust, rewrite, and re-engineer as we see fit. As indicated above, there is huge investment in development before any product is ready to hit the dealer shelves and, incredible as it may seem, some projects just get abandoned and written off. Before you submit anything please contact us first.