News February 12, 2024
Trader Joe’s Files Appeal of Judge’s Scathing Dismissal of Merch-Centered Lawsuit
The grocery chain believes a union has infringed on its trademarks in branded apparel, totes and other products sold to support unionization efforts.
Despite a judicial chastening, Trader Joe’s isn’t dropping its branded merchandise-related trademark infringement lawsuit against Trader Joe’s United, an independent union representing people who work at the grocery store chain.
U.S. District Judge Hernán D. Vera didn’t mince words when he dismissed Trader Joe’s suit in January.
Vera wrote that the suit was an attempt by the company to “weaponize the legal system to gain advantage in an ongoing labor dispute” with the union, adding that the attorneys who filed it risked Rule 11 – a sanction for submitting pleadings to a court for an improper purpose, often accompanied by frivolous arguments and lacking in evidentiary support.
Nonetheless, late last week, the California-headquartered grocery chain filed an appeal of Vera’s decision with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Trader Joe’s has accused the union of selling tote bags, mugs, buttons, T-shirts and hooded sweatshirts that use the grocer’s registered and common law trademarks. The company believes it’s in the right, despite Vera’s dismissal.
A Trader Joe’s spokesperson said the grocer will “continue to take all appropriate” steps to protect its legally held marks. “Trader Joe’s consistently takes legal action to protect our brand when we become aware that someone other than Trader Joe’s is selling merchandise using our trademarks and trade dress,” the spokesperson told HuffPost.
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The Lawsuit & the Dismissal
To help fund its worker-organizing efforts, Trader Joe’s United sells union-branded merchandise on its website.
In its lawsuit, Trader Joe’s claimed that some of the merch uses the grocery chain’s “typed word mark and stylized word mark, the unique Trader Joe’s typeface and red coloring, and/or the concentric circle design and general composition of the registered Trader Joe’s logo. … Trader Joe’s has not authorized the defendant to use Trader Joe’s intellectual property in this way to advertise and sell merchandise.”
The use of the grocer’s trademarks causes marketplace confusion, compelling consumers to think Trader Joe’s is selling or has endorsed the products, the company asserted. It asked the court to order the union to stop selling the swag with the alleged infringing graphics – and for other remedies, including damages.
Vera wasn’t having it.
A U.S. District judge dismissed Trader Joe’s trademark infringement case against union Trader Joe’s United, saying, in part, that the logo used by the union (right) is highly unlikely to be confused with the grocery chain’s logo (left) and therefore is not a trademark infringement.
For one thing, the judge said, the logos are distinctly different, not least of all because the union’s features a raised fist – “widely recognized as a symbol of labor, social and political movements” – and a box cutter.
“The logos used by the union are in a different font, do not utilize the distinctive fruit basket design, apply concentric rings of different proportions, and are applied to products that no reasonable consumer could confuse as coming from Trader Joe’s itself,” wrote Vera in his dismissal.
He further elaborated that the union’s products were for sale on its website, which clearly states opposition to Trader Joe’s labor practices. Therefore, no one of sound mind, Vera asserted, would visit the site and think the items were for sale by Trader Joe’s the company.
“There is no likelihood of confusion posed by the union’s campaign-related products” with Trader Joe’s legally held marks, said Vera, and as such, trademark infringement claims hold no water.
Vera added: “The court feels compelled to put legal formalisms to one side and point out the obvious. This action is undoubtedly related to an existing labor dispute, and it strains credulity to believe that the present lawsuit … would have been filed absent the ongoing organizing efforts that Trader Joe’s employees have mounted successfully in multiple locations across the country.”
Broader Labor Battle
The grocery chain’s appeal of Vera’s ruling comes as Trader Joe’s United strives to unionize workers at an ever-growing number of locations.
The effort has seen the union and the company lock horns. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has accused the company of illegally retaliating against workers, firing a union supporter and trying to undermine the organizing campaign with lies.
Rather than combat the various allegations in particular, an attorney for Trader Joe’s reportedly indicated at a hearing last month that the company intends to argue that the NLRB is “unconstitutional.”
Other well-known employers, including Starbucks and Medieval Times, have filed trademark suits in their battles against worker unionization efforts. Last year, a judge dismissed the Medieval Times suit.
“Although both employ red and yellow in some fashion [in the logos and costumes], ‘Medieval Times’ is written in different stylized fonts and colors,” wrote U.S. District Judge William J. Martini. “The Medieval Times Mark is written in yellow or red lettering in contrast to the [union] logo which is in black font. … Neither a side-by-side comparison nor the overall impression is confusingly similar.”
Medieval Times has appealed the dismissal.