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A rose by any other name....
With regard to any confusion folks seem to have over companies using
different names in different places.....it isn't illegal or wrong for a
company to do so, provided no fraud is being attempted in the process. A
corporation, before the law, is a "person" (at least it is here in Canada),
and has one and only one "official" name (the one that is registered on the
Articles of Incorporation). However, it is free to conduct day to day
business with the public under a different name, and that name might not be
registered with the same agency that granted the charter, be they
provincial, state or federal. However, that "trade" name or style WILL be
registered with someone, usually at the local level. A single corporate
entity is also free to operate several "storefront" businesses under
different "trade" names or styles. Again, each different "trade" name or
style must be registered, but they may not all be registered with the same
agency or level of government.
Similarly, a corporation might set up another, related corporation to
conduct a different facet of the same business and share the same trade
style and/or name. For example, many retail companies which were in
operation before the existence of the Internet set up separate divisions or
even separate corporations to conduct their online operations. These
companies might look like the same outfit, they may be owned by the same
shareholders, but they might very well be separate corporations. So long as
fraud is not being committed in the process, this is all perfectly legal and
nobody should infer that any company doing so is doing anything wrong.
It is a simple matter to conduct the necessary "corporate searches" at the
state and local level to determine the true corporate structure, should
anyone have the interest in doing so. Such information is part of the public
record. The Better Business Bureau is NOT the first place to start looking
for such information.
[Redacted] I can make no comment about the company as I have only ever dealt
with them once, and I got what I ordered with no problems, but nobody should
be putting them down simply because there appears to be confusion here on
the APD over what their exact name is.
James Purchase
Toronto