Flawed Evidence Undercuts “Charbucks” Trademark Suit In Starbucks Corp. v. Wolfe’s Borough Coffee, Inc., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed a district court’s decision denying injunctive relief in Starbucks’ trademark case against Black Bear Micro Roastery over Black Bear’s use of “Charbucks” for coffee. Starbucks sued Black Bear in 2001, alleging, among other things, trademark dilution in […] Continue Reading →
Fourth Circuit: Chewy Vuiton not likely to be confused with or dilute Louis Vuitton trademarks The Fourth Circuit Tuesday affirmed a district court's grant of summary judgment of no trademark infringement or dilution. At issue were dog toys that parodied the trademarks and trade dress of Louis Vuitton. The Fourth Circuit agreed that the successful parody resulted in no trademark infringement. On the trademark dilution claim, the court rejected the […] Continue Reading →
Ninth Circuit: PerfumeBay confusingly similar to eBay, but Perfume Bay is not In a decision yesterday, the Ninth Circuit affirmed a district court's finding that the mark "Perfumebay" was likely to be confused with eBay, and affirmed an injunction barring the use of the domains perfumebay.com and perfume-bay.com (as of today, both these domains are still functional). The court also affirmed the finding that the use of […] Continue Reading →
Ninth Circuit: Reversible error to only consider one of the likelihood of confusion factors In a trademark case yesterday, the Ninth Circuit held that the similarity-of-the-marks factor could not be considered exclusive of the other likelihood of confusion factors in determining trademark infringement. In doing so, the court reversed the grant of summary judgment against the defendant's counterclaims of trademark infringement, as well as the defendant's counterclaims for copyright […] Continue Reading →
Second Circuit: revisions to Federal Trademark Dilution Statute revive Starbucks claim The Second Circuit recently ruled that coffee giant Starbucks could proceed with its trademark dilution case against a defendant using the mark “Mr. Charbucks.” In 2005, the lower court found after a bench trial that Starbucks had not proven actual dilution of its trademark, the requirement under the earlier version of the statute. The statute […] Continue Reading →