Food and Restaurant Litigation

Frost Brown Todd Successfully Defends Trademark Infringement Case

Our client R.H. Phillips, Inc., a California estate winery, owns the successful varietal wine brand R.H. PHILLIPS. R.H. Phillips has produced and marketed the brand for a number of years. Nevertheless, when R.H. Phillips applied for U.S. registration of its trademark, a trademark examiner rejected the application. The examiner found that use of the trademark R.H. PHILLIPS would cause a likelihood of confusion of consumers in view of the earlier-registered and incontestable trademark PHILLIPS, used by Phillips Products Company as a brand name for various liquors.


This event was probably a source of encouragement to Phillips when it sued R.H. Phillips in Minnesota federal district court for trademark infringement, seeking to divest our client of its flagship brand, and laying claim to the profits R.H. Phillips had earned on sales of R.H. PHILLIPS wines. Also encouraging to Phillips were a number of prior court decisions suggesting the conclusion that consumers viewed all alcoholic beverages as related products.


With so much at stake for our client, Frost Brown Todd's IP litigators knew that this case required thinking outside the box – beyond the typical analysis that tends to rely on prior court decisions and arguments based on subjective consideration of the parties' respective marks, products, trade channels, sales data and so forth. We developed a multi-tiered strategy for attacking Phillips' case, based on expert application of principles of marketing science and consumer psychology, coupled with consumer research, showing conclusively that there was no likelihood that consumers would incorrectly perceive a connection between the R.H. PHILLIPS and PHILLIPS brands.


As a result, quickly after we moved for summary judgment, the case was settled quite favorably for our client, and R.H. PHILLIPS varietal wines will continue to appear on wine retailers' shelves and restaurant wine lists throughout the U.S.