Wineries get new tools for protecting trademarks, but disputes continue
尽管保护知识产权的业务最近获得了一些闪亮的新工具，但葡萄酒商之间关于商标的争议背后的许多挑战仍然相同。
The Trademark Modernization Act of 2020 called for the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office to develop ways to streamline the dispute process and clean up fraudulent and unused marks. Those rules took effect in December.
A key update was the allowance of third parties, including the PTO director, to undertake cancellation of marks not in use through expungement and re-examination proceedings. Those are key because “it is more difficult for legitimate businesses to clear and register their own marks,” the final rule said.
沃伦·德拉尼特（Warren Dranit）是一位知识产权律师，总部位于圣罗莎（Santa Rosa）的Spaulding McCullough＆Tansil，他解释了这种未使用的商标造成的困难。
Dranit说：“如果一个酿酒厂想引入一个新品牌或商标，但是一个人站在那儿，您将无法前进。”
新过程包括一个400美元的申请费和verified statement about “reasonable investigation of nonuse.” The PTO then is to pick up the effort, evaluating whether records warrant further inquiry. From that point, the one that registered the mark would have to provide evidence that it actually was in use to maintain that registration.
德拉尼特说，签署商标现代化法案的改进是在法院发现侵权的情况下的“无法弥补的伤害”的推定。在此之前，如果Mark执法行动正朝着诉讼迈进，目标是尽快获得初步禁令。
去年年底左右启动的另一个新的TMA规则是，申请人或注册人必须对代理行动做出回应，将其从六个月降低到三个月。
Fruit of the vineyard case
A wine trademark case that met a startling resolution recently after years in court was the battle over use of the name for a prized Napa Valley vineyard on labels. The Vineyard House in 2019 sued New York-based Constellation Brands, owner of Robert Mondavi Winery, over the use of the To Kalon Vineyard name.
在其指控中，葡萄园屋声称Constellation将葡萄园的名称放在葡萄酒上，这些葡萄园可能不包含真正来自该物业的水果。恒星反驳，声称侵犯了蒙达维（Mondavi）使用的名称已有三十年了，在2001年被星座（Constellation）收购之前。
A federal judge in California agreed with Constellation last year, granting a permanent injunction against The Vineyard House from using the name and awarding Constellation $2.3 million in attorney’s fees, out of the nearly $4.5 million it claimed. In her order, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers wrote that it was a case that never should have been filed, no less make it to trial, Reuters reported.
While that outlay for legal costs was extraordinary, IP litigation can run into hundreds of thousands of dollars for even small North Coast vintners, Dranit said. But proactive searches for conflicting marks can be $40,000 to $70,000, and annual monitoring for registrations and filings of marks typically is much less, he said.
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In another clash over use of well-known industry names, Santa Rosa-based Jackson Family Wines, one of the globe’s biggest wine producers, a year ago sued Central Valley-based E. & J. Gallo Winery over the latter’s newly introduced Cask & Cream wine, claiming that it was similar to Jackson’s La Crema brand and winery, The Press Democrat reported at the time.
杰克逊此前曾与世界上最大的葡萄酒商，北海岸品牌和数千英亩的区域葡萄园的所有者加洛（Gallo）冲突。2013年，杰克逊（Jackson）反对加洛（Gallo）向商标“ Cask＆Cream”的申请，该商标自1996年以来一直在生产的奶油利口酒的名称。2019年，杰克逊（Jackson）反对加洛（Gallo）对赌注和奶油葡萄酒的标记注册。
In late January of this year, Jackson and Gallo reached a settlement with prejudice, according to court records.
不参与此案的德拉尼特（Dranit）表示，葡萄酒品牌的扩散，尤其是饮料酒精标签，通常会使IP病例复杂化。
“Part of what confounds winery and other beverage producers is that it is such a crowded field,” Dranit said. “And the vagarity is how wine brands relate to other brands in beer and other alcoholic beverages. How close do they have to be for infringement?”
他说，一些法律分析将所有含酒精的饮料都聚集在一起，因此，如果商标接近，将会有侵权的指控。
