What Cut Do Authors Get For Mentioning Brand Names?
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on Tuesday, December 29th, 2009 at 6:03 pm and is filed under Product Branding.
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Authors don’t have to ask permission to use brand names. You might get that impression by reading issues of Writers Digest where companies have taken out ads reminding writers that Kleenex(tm) is a brand name, but companies do that to try to defend their trademarks. If people start referring to kleenex without capitals and as a generic term, the company has to show that it is fighting against such usage to defend and maintain its trademark. In fact, though, writers can say kleenex all they want, or Kleenex, or Kleenex(tm) (as the company would prefer).
Most of the time when I include brand names in my fiction, it’s because those names are such a part of the fabric of the stories reality that they help to create the illusion that the story could be true. Or the brand names may help to define a fictional character. A soldier who relaxes by reading Maxim or Playboy is not the same as a soldier who relaxes with Better Homes and Gardens.
There have been a few cases where writers have contracted with companies for product placement, but such contracts are rare and are often riduculed in the press when they happen.
They probably don’t get any cut at all. It may just be free publicity for the companies mentioned. If anything, the author would probably have to ask for permission to use the names in the first place.
Dean Koontz does that a lot, but I very much doubt he gets any money for it. He’s misused “taser” at least twice, LOL.
I think he does it just to sharpen the mental image you have of what he’s describing. Most of his books are pretty good.
Very famous authors might get something, but the majority don’t. If you write a book, you should do it for the sheer pleasure of it and what comes from it is just icing on the cake.
authors really don’t get anything at all for mentioning brand names. It really just gives a feeling of inside knowledge to the story.
None.
and they have to be very careful how they use the names to avoid any kind of slander or liable. Talk to a literary attorney. Pax – C