Consumer Guide Parent, Publications International, Denied New Trial, Ordered to Pay $5.6 Million

CHICAGO, Ill. — On May 28th, 2009, Judge Joan B. Gottschall of the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division declined to order a new trial or to reverse a $5.6 million jury verdict against Publications International of Lincolnwood, Ill. (PIL), the parent company of Consumer Guide, on a breach of contract claim brought by The Smart Marketing Group of Los Angeles, Calif. (SMG). “We applaud Judge Gottschall for upholding the jury verdict in this case,” said Mike Welch, SMG’s CEO. “We were put out of business by Consumer Guide, but this proves to us that if you are in the right, and are willing to trust our legal system, then you can win if a company acts in bad faith, even a multi-billion dollar company. In this situation the jury and the judge now agree that PIL acted in bad faith in dealing with SMG.”

“We’ve never understood why they did what they did, or why they do what they do, but this is a victory not only for us, but for all of the dealers we supported, and for small business owners everywhere,” said Bill Magarity, President of SMG.

“Now we’re told that because PIL can afford to, they will continue to appeal the jury verdict. But we’ll be here, we’re not going anywhere,” said Magarity.

Consumer Guide is now marketed online by How Stuff Works, Inc., a subsidiary of Discovery Communications, New York, N.Y.

To view a copy of court case judgement (PDF) please visit: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/4578999/SMG_Judgement_Docket .

To view a copy of Judge Gottschall’s order (PDF) please visit: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/8527848/Judges-order .

About Tabitha Berg

Tabitha Angel Berg is an aspiring author and musician and joined eNewsChannels in Nov. 2006 as an editor and mistress of the WP-based content management system (CMS). She likes ferrets better than cats and tea better than coffee, and is a devout iPad evangelist. Nobody pays her to like Dr. Pepper, but wouldn't you like to be a pepper, too?

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