When did the craft beer industry get so hostile?

So a startup brewery in TN is getting sued by a brewpub in NM because the brewery name contains the same word: Marble City Brewery vs Marble Brewery.
I personally don't see the grounds for suit especially since their distribution markets were initially no where near each other. Am I just being biased to support the little guy? What does everyone think of this?

http://www.metropulse.com/news/2011/mar/02/marble-city-brewing-company-stalled-trademark-laws/

It's happened before and it will happen again. Overzealous protection of trademarks, future markets, yadda yadda yadda. Personally, I'm with you in that I find it petty and turns me off from doing business with companies like that.

On the flip side, it isn't that hard to do some due diligence on the web. I live in the Copper state, but naming a brewery with Copper in it might get me, at the very least, dirty looks by about a half dozen other breweries (all out of state).

olllllo said:

On the flip side, it isn't that hard to do some due diligence on the web. I live in the Copper state, but naming a brewery with Copper in it might get me, at the very least, dirty looks by about a half dozen other breweries (all out of state).

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so is that to say that there can also never be another 'dog' or 'coast' brewery?

YOU people are really getting me PO'd...looks like the homebrew community is about to become a little hostile. It's GO time!!

ahave said:

so is that to say that there can also never be another 'dog' or 'coast' brewery?

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I wouldn't.

ahave said:

so is that to say that there can also never be another 'dog' or 'coast' brewery?

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No, but what about Dog head, or Dogfish? That would be more on the level of what's going on here. Marble Brewery and Marble City Brewery are just too darn close. It's just one left out word. I don't see why the latter brewery can't just change their name and chalk it up to, "Darn... we didn't get to it first".


Rev.

I could see the confusion, because I buy my tires at Firestone Walker.

Speaking of....

(In olllllo's back yard)

http://www.azcentral.com/community/...handler-beer-glass-dispute-sam-adams0304.html

AZ_IPA said:

http://www.azcentral.com/community/...handler-beer-glass-dispute-sam-adams0304.html

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Wow, thanks for sharing that. I for one am appalled by that. Firstly, I think having the ability to patent or trademark the shape of a glass is plain daft. It's just a shape! No one holds a patent for a weissbier glass shape, or a pint glass, or a Kwak style glass. I mean give me a break. I've drank Sam out of their glasses and typical pub glasses like the usual Guiness/Sam Smith shape and I've never noticed any difference. I think their marketing campaign for it is all BS hype.

That whole thing reminds me of people trying to trademark simple generic slogans like Paris Hilton or Lohan trying to sue E-Trade for using the name Lindsay.


Rev.

Lawyers gonna law.

jfr1111 said:

Lawyers gonna law.

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Yep. You know, my firm has a London office and in London for example if you sue someone and lose you have to pay the winner's legal fees. And why doesn't America do that?? It would prevent bigger companies from bullying the small guy. But nooo, America's law firms wouldn't want to cut out any potential business of course so our laws are written to exclude something so obviously sensible.


Rev.

Rev2010 said:

if you sue someone and lose you have to pay the winner's legal fees. And why doesn't America do that??

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Something similar was writting into AZ's immigration law...

In the case of the two breweries, it's quite possible that eventually one of the two would expand their market to include the others region. And there was a bit of similarity in the name. I can see a problem when they are in the same business. It's up to the courts to decide whether a name is similar enough to cause a problem with the nameholder.

Same thing happened here, a local brewery going by the name "Wildfire" got a order the stop using it from a restaurant in Chi-town the restaurant does not even make beer..
now my local brewery is called 10 Barrel Brewing

Henrythe9th said:

Same thing happened here, a local brewery going by the name "Wildfire" got a order the stop using it from a restaurant in Chi-town the restaurant does not even make beer..
now my local brewery is called 10 Barrel Brewing

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Yeah but that worked out for them. Wildfire was kinda stupid. The name change has served them well.

Are you the guy selling that Keggle on CL by any chance?

I'm not a fan of bogus law suits but the names are very similar. Like ollllo mentioned it really isn't that hard to look around for an hour to see if there are any other breweries with a similiar name.

They should rename it We Lost Our Marbles Brewery

BendBrewer said:

Yeah but that worked out for them. Wildfire was kinda stupid. The name change has served them well.

Are you the guy selling that Keggle on CL by any chance?

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Yeah, I like the 10 Barrel name a lot more too. I'm glad they're keeping the 10 Barrel system for doing specialty beers after the expansion this summer.

Rev2010 said:

Yep. You know, my firm has a London office and in London for example if you sue someone and lose you have to pay the winner's legal fees. And why doesn't America do that?? It would prevent bigger companies from bullying the small guy. But nooo, America's law firms wouldn't want to cut out any potential business of course so our laws are written to exclude something so obviously sensible.


Rev.

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What happens when a worker that was wrongly terminated by a multinational loses ? He has to pay the big guys legal fees too ? For the 10 lawyers they had on the case ?

Rev2010 said:

Yep. You know, my firm has a London office and in London for example if you sue someone and lose you have to pay the winner's legal fees. And why doesn't America do that?? It would prevent bigger companies from bullying the small guy. But nooo, America's law firms wouldn't want to cut out any potential business of course so our laws are written to exclude something so obviously sensible.


Rev.

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But what about when the little guy is suing the bigger guy, as is often the case?

Well I remember in high school I was so ready to graduate and get away from all of the jocks, bullies and general jackasses - only to learn later in life they never really go away.

It does not matter where you live, what industry, profession you work in or what hobbies you are into. There are jerks and jackasses around every corner waiting to sue you or take advantage of or just generally screw you over in some form or fashion.

To think one area like craft brewing is above all that is pretty wishfull thinking.

THANK YOU American legal system! But anyway... IP is IP... I'd protect mine if it was me.

this has gotten heated up again. look like it was dropped for a while, and now is serious.

i gotta say, i don't see the need in this. it seems that marble brewery has targeted this market as i've been seeing their brews in a store or two around here. funny how we have craft beer from new mexico and we can't get three floyds from indiana.

Do you have a C&D order?

Until then, brew on.

I'm not a lawyer, but as an engineer who used to work in research, I've been through enough training on intellectual property to know that it is not a "friviolous lawsuit" in this case, and in fact, the way the laws are written, the company MUST file a lawsuit against the alleged infringement or else risk losing the rights to it.

Don't blame the brewery for doing what they have to do-- if anything, blame the ones who have created the laws in this country, but in this case, even that seems like tilting at windmills.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. We as homebrewers and craft beer drinkers have a rose colored view of the craft beer industry. We want to think that all of the craft breweries in the world are united against the big bad BMC's of the world. The fact of the matter is breweries are businesses. Just like any other business they are interested in turning a profit and defending their products in the marketplace. If you heard that Walmart was suing another retailer for using a variation of their name, you wouldn't think twice about it. You might think it was a d!ck move, but you wouldn't really be all that surprised. It's no different in the beer market.

By the way, a trademark search takes about 20 minutes to do. I really don't know why people opening new businesses don't just do one, or spend a couple hundred bucks to pay an attorney to do one. To me it's just lazy.

Although, if it were me that got that letter, I'd probably just ignore it or send a letter back telling them to p!ss off. The chances they are actually going to pursue a trademark infringement case are pretty slim. Everyone wants to sue until they get that first bill for $250+ per hour.

While I don't understand these laws indepth, failure to defend a trademark sets you up to potentially lose it or allow others to use it. I had to do a write up on a trademark lawsuit once where a baseball card company had produced a bunch of cards yet failed to renew the yearly permission required. MLB sued them. It was interesting because the judge that wrote the review seemed to indicate that the MLB was apologetic for suing but couldn't risk having someone use their images without permission.

I think some people forget that people go into business to make money.

You should really do a little independent research about this matter before concluding that Marble Brewing is just defending its trademark and Marble City Brewing Company should have done its homework before picking its name. Not that I get to New Mexico or Arizona very often, but I would never give Marble Brewery a dime of my money. On the other hand, if I was in Knoxville I would be pleased to have a pint from Marble City Brewing Co.