Trademark Trouble is Brewing in the Craft Beer Industry

Double Barrel Brewing is now Eastwood Brewing. Denver Pearl will relaunch with a new name in September. Aviator and Lost Coast are coming to blows over their labels. What is happening in the craft beer industry? As this developing sector continues to expand, local breweries are seeking to increase their distribution and establish an identity. Helped along by regional and national restaurant chains, smaller brewing companies are quickly finding their “unique” brands on tables and bar tops in new markets. With this expansion comes opportunity—and a host of intellectual property issues. In the case of Double Barrel, a small Central New York brewer learned that his named possibly infringed on one registered years earlier by a California company. For Denver Pearl, the three-month-old brewery found itself confronting a legal challenge by the Pabst Brewing Company based on the company’s Pearl Lager. North Carolina-based Aviator created a unique label depicting crabs, an octopus, and a shark holding a mug of beer—the last sea creature looking similar to that depicted on Lost Coast’s “Great White Beer” bottle.

Although common law trademark protection arises from use in the market, federal trademark registration is the gold standard for ensuring a brand is both protected and protectable. As the craft market continues to grow, and local labels become national brands, the role of trademark registration will become even more important to ensuring the availability of new and unique craft brews.

Intellectual property attorneys focus on protecting the things a business creates. When trying to develop a brand, companies should get legal advice on what protections to seek and when to do so. A trademark attorney can help early in the process by researching which names are already in use, securing protections for a unique image or name, and helping to resolve conflicts with other businesses.

“The best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago. The second best time is today.” Every growing business, no matter how small at the moment, should consider the valuable role of intellectual property and be proactive in protecting it. Some brewers have learned the hard way—a bubbling business can quickly go flat.

Sources: http://www.law360.com/articles/562373/calif-brewer-attacks-rival-over-shark-trademark http://www.syracuse.com/drinks/index.ssf/2014/08/brewery_in_eastwood_changes_na.html http://blogs.denverpost.com/beer/2014/08/20/denver-pearl-brewing-changing-name-legal-threat/13826/

For more information on this topic, please visit our Trademark Litigation service page.

Klemchuk LLP is an Intellectual Property (IP), Technology, Internet, and Business law firm located in Dallas, TX.  The firm offers comprehensive legal services including litigation and enforcement of all forms of IP as well as registration and licensing of patents, trademarks, trade dress, and copyrights.  The firm also provides a wide range of technology, Internet, e-commerce, and business services including business planning, formation, and financing, mergers and acquisitions, business litigation, data privacy, and domain name dispute resolution.  Additional information about the IP law firm and its IP law attorneys may be found at www.klemchuk.com.

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