Archive for the ‘Trademarks’ Category

Never Ending Story Ends!

Tuesday, June 7th, 2011

Last December, we commented on a trademark infringement case, A Never Ending Story?, which involved Darden’s Olive Garden restaurant accusing rival Red Lobster of infringing the Never Ending Pasta Bowl® federally registered trademark through the latter’s “Never Ending Shrimp” promotion.  The parties have now settled on a permanent injunction which entails Red Lobster will never again use the offending designation “Never Ending” for its food-related promotions on any materials, websites, etc.  No answer, defenses, or actual damages were claimed, but it is interesting that Darden seems to have been granted a monopoly on the “Never Ending” adjective in the restaurant business, regardless of how descriptive of the actual product offering it is; Did Red Lobster yield too soon for a crustacean?

 

You Cannot Serve Both God and Pancakes, con’t. « The Trademark Blog

Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

Thanks to Marty Schwimmer’s The Trademark Blog for keeping an eye on the continuing saga of prayer and pancakes.   It is not as trivial as it sounds, because domains have no class restrictions like trademarks and after so many years, the initials IHOP may have a sound “secondary meaning” claim and need to avoid genericide.  Read the case at:

You Cannot Serve Both God and Pancakes, con’t. « The Trademark Blog.