Heitner Legal
Is “The Vitamin Shoppe” too generic of a name for the parent company to obtain trademark registration? After a year-long battle within the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) system, the answer is a resounding yes. Without a disclaimer for the entire mark, the TTAB was unwilling to reverse the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s […]
Is the word “RIOT” now so attached to the company Riot Games that no other company can use the word in its name? Riot Games seems to think so based on its recent initiation of a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
Ohio State was denied the trademark registration to “THE” and LeBron James lost in an attempt to register “TACO TUESDAY.” Neither outcome should be shocking, whether you are a trademark attorney or not.
Six-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady filed a trademark application to register the mark “Tom Terrific.” Three-time NBA champion LeBron James recently initiated an effort to register the trademark “Taco Tuesday.”
Gatorade used the slogan “Gatorade The Sports Fuel Company” and SportFuel, Inc. sued, claiming trademark infringement. The district court threw out the case after it decided that Gatorade’s slogan was construed as fair use. SportFuel appealed.
Mondelez is suing a company called Stoney Patch for trademark infringement. It claims that THC gummy products created and sold by Stoney Patch were intentionally designed to copy the Sour Patch brand under a confusingly similar name and packaging. It additionally says that it is especially concerned about confusing children, since the packaging is likely […]
The State of Illinois is home to a big new battle over the rights to use marks related to male grooming. You have definitely heard the words “manscaping” and “manscaped” used before, and now they are basically the subject of a federal court trademark dispute.
In 2019, if you want a quick, easy way to send or receive money without paying a fee, you are likely using the app Venmo. It has become so popular that people will often ask to be Venmo’d money. As can be the case, a noun becomes a verb based on heightened usage.
As of August 3, 2019, trademark applicants and registrants based outside of the United States will need a U.S.-based lawyer if they want to extend their protections to the U.S. A new rule announced by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) states that the U.S.-based lawyer must be in good standing of a bar […]
The rock band Guns N’ Roses has been around since 1984 and is a known name in the music industry to just about everyone in the United States. While the band members have spent most of their lives creating and performing music, they are now going to be occupied with litigating a trademark infringement lawsuit […]