February 12, 2025

Tullio Corradini

Trusted Legal Source

Connect 4: Trade Dress Infringement and Secondary Meaning

Connect 4: Trade Dress Infringement and Secondary Meaning

You are very likely familiar with the children’s recreation, Link 4, in which gamers fall pink and black checker items into an upright rack attempting to get 4 of their parts in a row to acquire. Some of you might have even found enlarged outdoor versions of the Join 4 video game at different venues. On August 24, 2022, the Ninth Circuit issued its belief in P and P Imports, LLC v. Johnson Enterprises, LLC, in which the functions ended up battling a trade gown infringement declare involving these substantial outside Join 4-like video games.

P and P Imports (“P&P”) sells outside video games underneath its GoSports manufacturer, and in December 2016, it commenced selling its “Giant 4 in a Row Game” that was dependent on the vintage tabletop edition. P&P offered its match through Amazon and eBay and climbed the best seller rankings on Amazon.

A couple of months later, Johnson Enterprises sought to expand its outside property video game choices and made the decision it, way too, would offer a huge Link 4-type activity. It evidently performed market place investigate and found that P&P was a single of the most thriving sellers on Amazon in this group. Johnson Enterprises acquired a duplicate of the P&P game, despatched samples to a Chinese producer, and began promoting an practically similar model of P&P’s sport that it known as “Tailgating Professionals White Connect 4” in Oct 2017. The two online games glance just about equivalent in colour, type and measurement and apparently differ only in the respective logos at the major of each individual game.

In March 2019, P&P sued Johnson Enterprises for trade dress infringement underneath area 43(a) of the Lanham Act and unfair competition below California legislation. P&P alleged that its trade gown was infringed by Johnson Enterprises promoting a almost identical activity that was “defined by its flat-white recreation board with round cutouts and flat, round purple and blue tokens.” P&P argued that this distinct trade dress experienced turn into “widely known and recognized” and had therefore obtained “secondary that means.” It more alleged that Johnson Enterprises intended to “deceive the general public as to the supply or origin” of its game to gain from “P&P’s goodwill and popularity in the 4 in a row sector.”

In the district courtroom, Johnson Enterprises moved for summary judgment trying to get to dismiss P&P’s declare. The district courtroom granted the movement, ruling that P&P had failed to develop proof “of secondary meaning” simply because it unsuccessful to show that buyers would associate its trade gown precisely with P&P, relying on a 2011 Ninth Circuit circumstance, Fleischer Studios, Inc. v. A.V.E.L.A., Inc., 654 F.3d 958. P&P appealed the summary judgment ruling to the Ninth Circuit. (This write-up will not deal with the difficulty of attorney’s service fees, that was also the subject of an attraction).

In get to confirm a trade costume infringement assert, a plaintiff should present: (1) the trade gown is nonfunctional, (2) the trade dress has acquired secondary meaning, and (3) there is a considerable chance of confusion concerning [the plaintiff’s] and [the defendant’] merchandise.” Artwork Attacks Ink, LLC v. MGA Ent. Inc., 581 F.3d 1138, 1145 (9th Cir. 2009). Offered the district court’s ruling on summary judgment, the Ninth Circuit concentrated its investigation on the next aspect, i.e., irrespective of whether P&P’s trade costume experienced acquired secondary meaning.

The Ninth Circuit commenced by recognizing that a product’s structure like “distinctive names, logos, packages or labels” may perhaps have developed a “source-identifying appearance.” If so, the solution might acquire trade dress safety and the maker of such solution can retain a claim for trade costume infringement under the Lanham Act.

The Ninth Circuit mentioned that “secondary meaning” exists when “in the minds of the general public, the primary significance of [the trade dress] is to establish the source of the product or service somewhat than the product or service by itself.” The district court, in deciphering the Ninth Circuit’s Fleischer case, held that this meant that P&P experienced to establish that buyers exclusively linked P&P’s game with P&P as opposed to some other solitary or nameless supply.

The Ninth Circuit concluded that the demo court docket focused as well greatly on a one sentence and misinterpreted the actual holding of the Fleischer situation. The Ninth Circuit pointed out that mainly because Fleischer experienced been made a decision by a 3-judgment panel, it could not overturn prior Ninth Circuit binding choices that experienced held that secondary which means intended “association with only a single – even anonymous – resource.” Notwithstanding this, the Ninth Circuit ongoing by recognizing that the demo court experienced omitted extra language from Fleischer that even more confirmed an mistake in its locating. For instance, Fleischer held that “secondary meaning” can be “an association `with the identical resource’.” That is the Ninth Circuit created obvious that it was not essential to clearly show that buyers knew the title of the resource, only that the solution arrived from “a one, albeit anonymous supply.” The Ninth Circuit found that the district court’s looking through of Fleischer was also contradicted by the language of the Lanham Act that specifically offers that a source may possibly even be unfamiliar in order for trade costume protection to utilize.

The Ninth Circuit then turned to no matter whether there was evidence ahead of the trial court docket to create secondary which means sufficient to stay clear of summary judgment. The Ninth Circuit noted that courts must take into consideration a amount of factors, which include “direct buyer testimony survey evidence exclusivity, method and length of use of a mark volume and manner of promoting amount of money of revenue and variety of prospects proven place in the market and evidence of intentional copying by the defendant.” Since each of these factors are usually factual issues, summary judgment is normally disfavored in circumstances of trade gown infringement. The Ninth Circuit pointed out that the presence of at least two factors, these kinds of as intentional copying and survey proof, can be sufficient to steer clear of summary judgment on a trade costume infringement assert.

The Ninth Circuit initial acknowledged that “proof of copying strongly supports an inference of secondary meaning.” That is, when a single is purposely copying a competitor’s solution, it is very likely trying to get “to comprehend on a secondary this means that is in existence.” The Ninth Circuit discovered it considerable that Johnson Enterprises had carried out marketplace exploration into P&P’s solution, purchased a copy of it that it sent to its Chinese company, and began offering a nearly identical recreation just months afterwards. The Courtroom identified that this evidence “strongly suggests that Johnson [Enterprises] deliberately copied the P&P match.”

Johnson Enterprises argued that, although it may have copied the game’s parts, this proof was not relevant considering the fact that these solution attributes had been “wholly functional” and there was no proof that Johnson Enterprises “intended to confuse buyers and pass off its product or service as the Plaintiffs.” The Ninth Circuit observed that though some circuits, this kind of as the Tenth Circuit, has adopted identical reasoning on this difficulty, the Ninth Circuit has limited the problem of intent to confuse to the component of likelihood of consumer confusion, which it observed was a different factor. In addition, the Ninth Circuit held that even if these types of an intent was demanded, courts have held that these types of intent can be “inferred when the defendant copies a product’s structure and marketing and advertising.” The Court observed that Johnson Enterprises copied much of P&P’s product description and that though such language could had been predicted, “its determination to crib identical language from P&P’s ad indicates that Johnson intentionally cast its game as P&P’s.” The Courtroom found it substantial that the two online games are similar besides for the logs displayed on the products.

The Ninth Circuit cautioned that offered that it was ruling on a grant of summary judgment, a jury could nonetheless come across that “Johnson’s copying of P&P’s match and its advertising does not create secondary this means.” The Ninth Circuit observed (considerably tongue and cheek) that: “Indeed, it could seem a little bit prosperous that P&P accuses Johnson of copying its video game when the two are effectively oversized knock-offs of Join 4.”

The Ninth Circuit also found it substantial that P&P supplied survey proof from an specialist who discovered that 63% of respondents said that P&P’s match ought to have arrive from a solitary resource/firm. The specialist opined that this “strongly suggests that P&P’s trade costume obtained secondary meaning.” Courts can take into consideration this kind of surveys offered that they: (1) have a correct basis and are suitable and (2) any challenges about the survey’s methodology, structure, reliability, and so on. “go to the excess weight of the study fairly than its admissibility.”

The Ninth Circuit concluded that the demo court erred in obtaining the study proof to be irrelevant because the demo court was too narrowly targeted on a unique association with P&P (as opposed to a far more common “single source” attribution). The Ninth Circuit rejected Johnson Enterprises’ argument that the survey was not relevant since it had been performed 2 ½ several years immediately after its merchandise experienced strike the current market. The Ninth Circuit cautioned that a plaintiff is “not essential to preemptively conduct shopper surveys in anticipation of litigation.” Relatively, courts have routinely “admitted surveys conducted several years immediately after the initial alleged infringing use.” All over again, the Ninth Circuit cautioned that the study proof could be matter to assault in that respondents may have been a lot more possible to attribute P&P’s recreation to the initial Milton Bradley Join 4 activity and not to P&P. The Court docket observed that this may well be an difficulty for the events at the time of trial. Nevertheless, due to the fact P&P had arrive forward with proof of both of those intentional copying and study proof, the trial court improperly granted summary judgment to Johnson Enterprises.

The Ninth Circuit’s conclusion in P and P Imports offers an instance of the kind of proof a plaintiff need to be well prepared to post to a courtroom to build the element of secondary meaning in prosecuting a trade dress infringement claim.