February 2005
Adidas have won a German Court ruling
A German court recently ruled in favour of Adidas's popular three-parallel-stripe design. As a result, Nike and Tom Tailor were banned from selling sportswear with two-parallel-stripes along the side and were both ordered to pay damages as well as being subjected to a penalty sum if any further infringing products were sold. This was the outcome despite the fact that their own famous logos accompanied the infringing stripes.
Adidas, the world's second largest sportswear manufacturer, was founded in 1949 by a man called Adolf Dassler - hence Adi Das - and went public in 1995. It has net annual sales of about €6.5bn (£4.5bn). The ruling was quite a surprise given that another sportswear company, Fitnessworld, was not restrained from using a double-stripe motif on their clothing in 2003, when a ruling from the European Court of Justice defeated Adidas' claim. The court ruled in that particular case that "The proprietor of a trade mark with a reputation cannot prevent the use of a similar sign viewed purely as a decorative motif". The court decided that Fitnessworld were not using the stripes in a trade mark sense but purely for decorative purposes. This is in line with what Nike and Tom Tailor tried to argue in claiming that their stripes too were purely an embellishment/ decoration.
BRIFFA Comment:
The decision was made on the basis of what was believed to be the extent of consumer awareness for the three stripes of Adidas. The court held that unlike Fitnessworld, consumers might establish a link between Adidas and Nike/ Tom Tailor clothing, which could result in the dilution of a brand owner's rights, in this case, Adidas. The outcome of the firm's efforts to essentially monopolise on the use of stripes in sports clothing is bound to cause some upset.
On the one hand, there is a clear reluctance to extend trade mark protection in such a way as to prevent the use of common decorations and motifs such as stripes. On the other hand, a company should not be permitted to freeload of the back of a very strong global brand by using a similar or identical design. A balance must be struck. At the moment however, the position is unclear. For example, what would be the situation with one stripe, or four stripes in a sportswear range, or three stripes in a non-sportswear range etc?