Roach Motel is an American brand of a

roach bait Roach bait is a pest control method used for the extermination of cockroaches in indoor locations. This method of pest control exploits the cannibalistic and coprophagic tendencies of cockroaches. Mechanism Cockroaches live in nests. Therefore ...

device designed to catch

cockroach Cockroaches (or roaches) are insects belonging to the Order (biology), order Blattodea (Blattaria). About 30 cockroach species out of 4,600 are associated with human habitats. Some species are well-known Pest (organism), pests. Modern cockro ...

es. Although the term is the subject of a

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a form of intellectual property that consists of a word, phrase, symbol, design, or a combination that identifies a Good (economics and accounting), product or Service (economics), service f ...

registration by the insect control brand Black Flag, the phrase roach motel has come to be used as a reference to all traps that use a

scent An odor (American English) or odour (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-our, -or, see spelling differences) is a smell or a scent caused by one or more volatilized ...

or other form of

bait Bait may refer to: General * Bait (luring substance), bait as a luring substance ** Fishing bait, bait used for fishing Film * ''Bait'' (1950 film), a British crime film by Frank Richardson * ''Bait'' (1954 film), an American noir film by Hugo ...

to lure cockroaches into a compartment in which a sticky substance causes them to become trapped. Introduced in late 1976 in response to the success of

d-CON d-CON is an America brand of rodent control products, which is distributed and owned in the United States by the UK-based consumer goods company Reckitt. The brand includes traps and baits for use around the home for trapping and killing some ...

's roach trap, the Roach Motel quickly became a successful entrant in the industry. By 1979, ''New York'' magazine reported, "On the strength of its whimsical packaging and an aggressive ad campaign, the Roach Motel now dominates the market, outselling the closest competition by as much as three to one in some cities." Early versions of the Roach Motels used food-based bait, but later designs incorporated

pheromone A pheromone () is a secreted or excreted chemical factor that triggers a social response in members of the same species. Pheromones are chemicals capable of acting like hormones outside the body of the secreting individual, to affect the behavio ...

s. The widely known

tagline In entertainment, a tagline (alternatively spelled tag line) is a short text which serves to clarify a thought for, or is designed with a form of, dramatic effect. Many tagline slogans are reiterated phrases associated with an individual, so ...

of the Roach Motel was, "Roaches check in, but they don't check out!" This phrase has also been applied to information technology systems such as

enterprise resource planning Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is the integrated management of main business processes, often in real time and mediated by software and technology. ERP is usually referred to as a category of business management software—typically a suit ...

, which readily capture transaction data but make it difficult for organizations to access, report and analyze the data stored in the system. Black Flag also marketed a related insect trap, the "Flyport," designed to deal with unwanted flying insects like houseflies, with the tagline, "Lots of arrivals, but no departures!" It was less successful than the Roach Motel. "Roach Motel" is United States federal trademark No. 1,059,314, for which Black Flag claims a date of earliest use of May 7, 1976.

References

External links

Information
at Black Flag website Insecticide brands Products introduced in 1976 Trademarks American brands {{Product-stub