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I had to take a domain blog break and take care of some other biz, unfortunately I am shutting down a business that I have had for over 20 years now and it is time consuming because I am trying to source the products that I will no longer offer to my customers so they can still get them from somebody else and also contact them all and tell them the news. Why am I doing this? It’s a crazy story.
In 1993 I started a company that processed and sold herb teas and extracts, it became a success and was my passion and my living for 15 years, I really loved it and believed in the products I was selling, I always produced top quality products and consistently received positive feedback from my customers, I didn’t invent the herbs and herbal formulas I made, most of them had been used for centuries by Native Americans and other cultures.
But then in 2008 the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) came after me, they said my website made “false and/or unsubstantiated claims” in violation of the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1917. The claims were feedback that customers had posted on my Yahoo store and information on the herbs and what they have traditionally been used for, I got this information from the NCCAM.NIH.gov official website (National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine at the National Institutes of Health), this is a US Government website that provides herbalists like myself accurate and established information on the herbs I was selling so I am not making stuff up like a snake oil salesman, here is what the NCCAM is as posted at Wikipedia:
NCCAM was established in October 1991, as the Office of Alternative Medicine (OAM), which was re-established as NCCAM in October 1998.[1] Its mission statement declares that it is “dedicated to exploring complementary and alternative healing practices in the context of rigorous science; training complementary and alternative medicine researchers; and disseminating authoritative information to the public and professionals.”
The NCCAM at NIH (one branch of the US Government) encouraged herbalists like myself to use this information, the FTC and FDA (another branch of the US Government) said I was breaking the law by sharing this information which they say is false and/or unsubstantiated.
It was bullshit imo and my attorney’s opinion, I had a great attorney, Richard Jaffe author of Galileo’s Lawyer, but what could I do, so I sued them back, and once we filed that lawsuit all hell broke loose. It got sent out over the AP and I was on all the local and national news with headlines like “Company files suit against the FTC to protect right to share historical use claims with consumers“, after that the quackbusters started really messing with me and my wife, it was ugly and threatening.
The FTC also said that the positive feedback customers left on my site when they said a particular herb helped them with a particular problem were unsubstantiated claims that I had to back up with double blind studies? So if a customer left feedback that the Chinese Astragalus Root they bought from me really helped them with blah blah blah problem the FTC was saying that I was making this claim and since Astragalus has not been shown to help with blah blah blah problem in double blind FDA studies then I as the site owner was making false unsubstantiated illegal claims, the law they were using was from 1917.
In 2008 feedback on Yahoo stores and Ebay and other sites is standard operating procedure, as a seller I can’t go change feedback for obvious reasons, so we argued the absurdity of this, the FTC did update the rules in 2009, I would not be in trouble today with these new rules for what I got in trouble for in 2008.
Then in 2009 I got paralyzed in a car accident and had to just drop the lawsuit and settle out of court, it sucked, I couldn’t run my company properly after this accident and I was so turned off with the whole dietary supplement industry after this what I consider harassment by the FTC I just couldn’t get excited about selling herbs anymore, and nobody wanted to buy my company after this, when a supplement company gets kissed by the FTC or the FDA it’s the kiss of death, it’s like I had the plague or ebola, so it just died on the vine and I am officially closing the doors at the end of this year, it is sad.
Here is an article about it: Consumer Protection or Legal Extortion?
Here are the domain picks dropping on December 4th 2014:
AmpTubes.com – As a guitar player I always liked tube amps which use amp tubes
AmpUp.com – Nice 5L, maybe amped up would be better but this is shorter
ArtMakers.com – I know many people that make art, $5.3k Estibot value
AustinBroadcast.com – Anybody remember Austin City Limits, great broadcast
BBWLingerie.com – $5.2k Estibot because Big Beautiful Women Lingerie is big
CampCook.com – Makes me think of Iggy Pop in Dead Man lol
CannabisCheap.com – $50 ounces on Black Friday in Denver, that is cheap
CannabisNet.com – This is becoming a huge biz if you haven’t been paying attention
EinsteinOnline.com – I’ve been called Einstein, because of my hair not my brain
GolfReward.com – Estibot values at $0 but lots of NJ bidders implies more value
HarleyTalk.com – Nice blog name for a Harley enthusiast, not sure about TM issues
LoveBombs.com – Send a love bomb not a cluster bomb
MixingMastering.com – I do this so I like it
NMCannabis.com – I smoke New Mexico Cannabis so I like this too lol
RetailPlatform.com – $2.6k Estibot with decent CPC and no NJ bids yet
TopCarParts.com – I’ve sold a few “Top” domains, still have TopShopping.com
Barack.net – Looks like a first name, I’ve never known a Barack though
EroticVideos.net
GVG.net
Harassed.net
MerchantFunding.net
Cleanest.org
Electrode.org
Faced.org
iFight.org
Commitment.me
eNetwork.me
Heavyweight.me
HerbTea.me
Surviving.me
Reinvent.tv
Slimming.tv
Thai.tv
Jingle.info
AllAmerican.biz
Entry.biz
Make sure you also check out Domain Shane’s Big List of names and Domaining.com for some other great domain blogs and domain name lists.
Domain of the day: HerbMed.com – Make me an offer!
Thanks for stopping by…
Sorry to hear all that. It really sucks.
And I know how it is not to be excited about a project any more…
How is your injury healing?
My arm is healing up good Kon, thanks for asking. What project are you not so excited about anymore?
That is good.
There were a few websites I was running in the past.
One was destroyed by a hacker and I didn’t have a recent backup of the forum so I just closed it.
That’s a bummer Kon, thanks for reminding me to do a backup…
Welcome back Mark!
I’m sorry for your business, but I’m sure you will start new successful ones, keep the faith!
In regards to EinsteinOnline.com, “Einstein” is a trademarked term so be careful if you want to bid on this domain. Do some trademark research first.
Thanks for the heads up Eric, I was not aware of the TM on Einstein, it is always good to do a little research first before investing in a domain…
Mark – So sorry to hear you have been taken out of business because of BIG GOVERNMENT. Bureaucrat’s are killing small business’s and entrepreneur’s dreams at an alarming rate in America….FDA,EPA,FAA,FTC,IRS, and Homeland Security(YES, Homeland Security,I shut down a million dollar biz in 2012 courtesy of Homeland Security)are all enemies of entrepreneur’s and small business’s…Common sense just does not apply when the alphabet soup comes after your money……
Domain of the day: WashingtonEstablishment.com
It sucks Aaron. And I like that your domain of the day is always so on point to the subject matter…