Community Corner
Pest Control Company Says It Will Pay You $2K To Release Roaches In Your Home
A Raleigh-based pest control company, Pest Informer, wants to pay households $2,000 to let them release roaches in their home for a study.
![Pest Informer wants to release 100 roaches into your home as part of study. Volunteers will get $2,000.](https://patch.com/img/cdn20/shutterstock/23629258/20220610/101632/styles/patch_image/public/shutterstock-1078178402___10101200928.jpg)
NORTH CAROLINA — If crawling insects are your thing, or you’re looking for some extra home guests, a pest company has a unique offer.
You can make $2,000 if you let Pest Informer, based in Raleigh, release 100 American cockroaches into your home. Yes, that’s right. The company is looking for about five to seven brave households to volunteer.
The purpose of the experiment is to study a “specific pest control technique.” The cockroaches will have to stay in the home for about 30 days and the technicians will be required to film the process. Other pest-control techniques are forbidden during the study.
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"As technology advances, we’re always looking for the newest and greatest ways to get rid of pest—cockroaches specifically," the company posted on its website.
So far, about 100 applications have been submitted, David Floyd, an editor with Pest Informer, told Patch Friday in an email.
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"We'll be leaving the applications open for another month, so I'm assuming we'll receive a bit more attention," he said.
Floyd said that he's worked as a pest control technician and has run his own pest control company for the last 20 years.
"During this time, I often ran into families who had to put themselves into financial struggle just to pay for a pest control company and live pest-free," he said. "I'm a big proponent that having a pest-free home should be a basic human right, so the overall goal of this study is to test DIY cockroach treatments in a real environment, and then deliver our findings for free on our website."
Only stipulations are that the homeowner must give written approval, must be at least 21 years old, and the house must be in the United States.
At the end of the study, Floyd said they'll get rid of the roaches for free.
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