Jack Wills Wins trademark infringement battle With House Of Fraser
Casual clothing maker, Jack Wills has won a legal battle with House of Fraser after the department store used a similar logo to the brand’s distinctive pigeon in a top hat. Jack Wills, the clothing brand favored by Prince Harry and other public school students is often seen by fashion conscious youngsters as giving them a sense of status class, wealth, and even education.
Jack Wills is known by its distinctive pheasant with a top hat and cane logo while the ‘Linea’ brand of House of Fraser, has a logo of a pigeon in a hat, but without a cane. Jack Wills has been using the pheasant logo since the brand was established in 1999 and similarities were noted between the two.
After a battle in the High Court, Judge, Mr Justice Arnold, ruled that House of Fraser had in fact infringed the fashion brand’s logo with a deliberate effort to confuse the shoppers. He observed this case as what he said “a classic case of a retailer seeking to enhance the attraction of its own brand goods by adopting an aspect of the get-up of prestigious branded goods.”
Even after abandoning the logo last year, around 20,000 t-shirts were reportedly sold in a 15-month period by the House of Fraser.
Jeremy Hertzog, IP Partner at Mishcon de Reya, which represented Jack Wills, said that his clients had to take measures to prevent the distinctiveness of its famous pheasant trade mark. If it had not done so, it would have encouraged other clothing brands to use emblems of birds wearing top hats and other human adornments and take advantages of the goodwill of his clients.
No immediate response for a comment request was available from House of Fraser.
Trademark Registration in Japan
Patent Attorney：Hiroshi Oogai
Address：304 BUREX Hirakawacho 1-5-15 Hirakawa-cho,
Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo
Phone：＋81-3-4570-0792
Mail：contact @ trademark-registration-japan.com
