Trademark Infringement 12

[DCSP John]

Had a contract customer request a 300 shirt rush order.
1/1, darks.. Not a problem.

Art comes in - its a collab with a car dealership logo
and the NEW Star Wars Rogue (TM) logo on the back.

I respectfully declined to accept the job. No one could provide the proper release.
I  have a very irrate contract customer who 'promised the customer that they could do the shirts,
and now are in a 'major bind'...

How do you effectively communicate to a customer that you work within the confines
of 'best business practices', and are not in the business of printing copyrighted, trademarked material
without the proper licenses or releases?.. Trying not to sour future business, but Disney has a whole team of lawyers
just looking for 'rogue' printers...

John

[Frog]

Assuming that the end user is a Nissan dealer, your guy should should be able to check with the chain of command just what rights they do, indeed have with the cross advertising campaign Nissan has with Disney right now. This may not be as completely funky as it seems, though of course, the burden to get the lowdown and permission is on them.

[aauusa]

i see this a little differently.  contract customer is another business and he is reselling them to the end user.  I would have printed the job as the responsibility for copyright checking will lay on him and not the printer.    if there is an issue the lawyers will not know you printed the shirts they wil come after the dealership and him as they are the ones using the logo not you.   

[mk162]

you still made money on it, they can VERY easily add your name to the lawsuit as well.  Happened to my dad...

He bought lakefront property.  The guy that owned that lot and 4 others hired  dredging company to come in to remove about 8 ft of lake bottom to make the bay deeper for better dock access. instead of hauling the dirt a couple miles to a farm they dumped it on another lot.  So the original owner of the 5 lots wouldn't pay the dredging company.  So they sued the owner of the 4 remaining lots and my dad, even though he closed on the property before the dredging contract was signed.  The dredging company's lawyer saw money to be made, so he added the current lot owner since he gained value to his property by having deeper water off his dock.

[trebor]

The best example I  have ever heard concerning this type of stuff is....isn't the car driver in a bank robbery just as responsible as the gang that goes in to rob the bank?

[royster13]

i see this a little differently.  contract customer is another business and he is reselling them to the end user.  I would have printed the job as the responsibility for copyright checking will lay on him and not the printer.    if there is an issue the lawyers will not know you printed the shirts they wil come after the dealership and him as they are the ones using the logo not you.

Lawsuits for trademark infringement always name everyone and when the judgements is made there are "wholly and severally liable" meaning they can get money wherever it is easiest to get from....If you have a "hold harmless" in your contract with your client and the client has money you will then have to "sue" them to recover your losses...But that can be a "slippery slope" if your client does not have a "pot to piss in"....
 

[kingscreen]

i see this a little differently.  contract customer is another business and he is reselling them to the end user.  I would have printed the job as the responsibility for copyright checking will lay on him and not the printer.    if there is an issue the lawyers will not know you printed the shirts they wil come after the dealership and him as they are the ones using the logo not you.

False.  The printer have/will be held responsible for being the actual manufacturing the infringing/counterfeit goods.
This is a common misconception.  If the lawyers come knocking, they're taking the customer and the printer down.
If a TM protected logo/likeness comes into your shop, especially Disney or NLF/MLB/etc., you better be damn certain it's legit.

I knew a company that was producing embroidered hats in Atlanta with a mashup of the LA Dodgers logo and Atlanta Braves logos.
In less than a week on sale exclusively on their website, they received a cease and desist letter with pages of lawyer signatures.

Another example is the Atlanta Barves shirts and the company that was making those in 2012.  You can Google about it. 
They were being made by http://www.babyrobotindustries.com/  <--- Go ahead and click on that to see how the story ends.

[DCSP John]

There is plenty of other money to be made without working in a 'grey area', and I have no
desire make my money by printing bootleg product...

It is in fact a Nissan dealership, so I am not sure why my customer made no mention
of the cross marketing with Disney.. I still would have asked for a proper release,
I never questioned the validity of the request, but it

Basically - I am not willing to assume any liability for a contract customer
who does not fulfill their end of the contract....

[mk162]

Interestingly, the Braves Tomahawk was never trademarked.  You can produce items with that.  I knew a guy making birdhouses that were the same tomahawks.  Sold them to giftshops and vendors all over around the stadium.  Made great money doing it until they market for them had dried up.

[3Deep]

Someone that don't care will bootleg it for them, just about anything now days is in question, if it's making big money

[Sbrem]

i see this a little differently.  contract customer is another business and he is reselling them to the end user.  I would have printed the job as the responsibility for copyright checking will lay on him and not the printer.    if there is an issue the lawyers will not know you printed the shirts they wil come after the dealership and him as they are the ones using the logo not you.

After a mess we were in a long time ago, if you're a professional printer, this is something you are supposed to know, just like accountant is supposed to know a bit about tax law... you can't play dumb

Steve

[sweetts]

As the printer you are the professional, I believe contract printers have been held liable for this exact situation. Also morally you should not print it if you feel something is amiss. IMO

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

[Croft]

Just heard on the radio this morning about an artist up here , that saw her designs on shirts in Marshals , She contacted the major retailers that had her design on shirts and was basically told to stuff it and here is the last known address and contact for there LA manufacturer/ screen printer which were all dead ends, It will be interesting to see where this ends up a news Fraud show has picked it up and is asking the questions now.

[royster13]

Just heard on the radio this morning about an artist up here , that saw her designs on shirts in Marshals , She contacted the major retailers that had her design on shirts and was basically told to stuff it and here is the last known address and contact for there LA manufacturer/ screen printer which were all dead ends, It will be interesting to see where this ends up a news Fraud show has picked it up and is asking the questions now.

That was "copyright" infringement of art that was not registered...."Trademark" infringement of a registered brand is a way different animal....

[Prints Charming]

don't do it! My very first Google review was from someone who want a Disney character and I called her after the order was takenand told her we would do the job.I got a lot of customers that came in because they saw this review and said she was wrong and wanted to business with us.