Right, but the suggestion wasn't "have a short consult with a lawyer". That's not cheap, but definitely won't break the bank for most small businesses.

The suggestion was "hire a legal representative" to be the corporate witness. I would assume that's a suggestion similar to the one in this article (https://www.agilelaw.com/blog/hiring-a-lawyer-to-be-your-30b...) about hiring a lawyer to be your 30(b)(6) deponent.

So, let's assume we hire a lawyer at $300/hour. Let's say they'll be a witness for 6 hours. But, they need to be carefully briefed and prepped on all the topics that they would need to be a witness for. Maybe that's 40 hours of work.

46*$300 = $13,800.

As the article on 30(b)(6) depositions notes: "So to do it right, the lawyer will need to be thoroughly prepped on the 30(b)(6) notice topics, which will certainly take time and cost the client money. No one said litigation is cheap."

I think most small-businesses would probably choose to use an internal employee to be their corporate representatives, especially in a matter such as this where they aren't directly involved in the litigation.

Often I've gotten the initial consultation/advice for free on how to do it yourself. The point of lawyer is protecting you when you are in danger, and in my experience they're happy to tell you that you don't need a lawyer here, and give some general tips on the process.