CLEVELAND, Ohio — A company that owns a chain of boiled seafood restaurants says in a lawsuit that a restaurant in Cleveland Heights’ Cedar Lee neighborhood infringed on the company’s federal trademarks by using a similar name and concept.
The lawsuit, filed Friday in federal court in Cleveland, says the Boiling Seafood Crawfish restaurant on Lee Road and affiliated companies are infringing on trademarks owned by Boiling Crab Franchise, a California company that has restaurants in that state, as well as in Houston, Las Vegas, Honolulu and in South Miami, Florida.
It says the Boiling Seafood Crawfish companies opened restaurants in recent years, starting with the Cleveland Heights location in 2015, that imitated the name of The Boiling Crab chain. A location in Columbus followed in 2017, and the company has plans to open a third in Buffalo, according to the lawsuit.
This, along with using a similar logo, was done “in a clear effort” to confuse customers into thinking the new restaurants were affiliated with The Boiling Crab, according to the lawsuit. The defendants also imitated The Boiling Crab’s “distinctive concept and menu,” the suit says.
“Defendants’ use of the Infringing Marks for restaurant services is likely to cause confusion, mistake, and deception of consumers as to the source, quality, and nature of Defendants’ services and goods, thereby proximately causing injury to The Boiling Crab and its trademark rights,” according to the lawsuit.
The suit says lawyers for The Boiling Crab sent a letter to defendants in January 2018 which said the names “Boiling Seafood” and “Boiling Seafood Crawfish” were problematic and demanded the company stop using them.
The lawsuit alleges trademark infringement and unfair competition. It asks for a federal judge to bar the defendant companies from using names similar to The Boiling Crab and misleading customers into believing the two organizations are associated with one another.
The Boiling Crab also wants all the profits the defendants made while infringing on the trademarks, according to the lawsuit.
Mark Wallach, The Boiling Crab’s attorney, said his client “has spent substantial amounts of money and time and effort developing a trademark that has meaning.”
Even if the words or phrases used in a trademark are common, they can infringe on a trademark once a particular chain or company uses and promotes them, he said.
Wallach said it’s important for an owner to protect a trademark, lest they lose it. The company filed another lawsuit in Florida in February, according to court records.
The owner of Boiling Seafood Crawfish did not immediately return a phone call.
The case is assigned to U.S. District Judge Dan Polster.
Click here to read the lawsuit on a mobile device.
https://www.cleveland.com/court-justice/2019/03/cleveland-heights-boiling-seafood-restaurant-faces-trademark-lawsuit-over-name.html 2019-03-15 21:56:00Z
0 Comments:
Post a Comment