Dilution Law Protects Brand Value, Not Just Consumer Choice

El estudio contribuye al conocimiento de la dilución de marcas registradas, llegando hasta el efecto -aún no estudiado- sobre la decisión de compra, y pone de manifiesto la importancia de la protección de las marcas famosas o renombradas, con el objeto de evitar daños no sólo en las percepciones del consumidor, sino también en las ventas y el valor financiero de la marca.

Brand Separation: Starting from 2003, BMW began producing Rolls-Royce cars at a new facility in Goodwood, England, thus making use of the Rolls-Royce trademark that it had licensed. Volkswagen’s Focus: Volkswagen concentrated on Bentley, successfully reinvigorating the brand and increasing its market share. ... Resolution: There was no dilution lawsuit per se, but rather a complex situation involving the separation of brand rights from manufacturing assets.

§ 1125(c), creates a federal cause of action to protect famous marks from unauthorized use; to prevent others from trading upon the goodwill and established renown of such marks; and to prevent dilution of the distinctive quality of such marks.

The measure used in the Nikepal case cannot tell us which of the outcomes is more likely and, for that reason, lacks construct validity; that is, it cannot be taken as a valid measure of harm. The marketing literature is very clear on how a brand suffers harm. Marketers would describe harm to a brand (or trademark) as a diminution of (customer-based) brand equity.24 Professor Kevin Lane Keller characterizes brand awareness and brand image as the components of customer-based brand equity.25 Brand image in turn is built from strong, favorable, and unique brand associations.

even though dilution is now a federal claim, it remains a marginal cause of · action that has little practical impact. See infra notes 339-342 and ... C. The Failure of the Traditional Justification for Trademark ... Perspective, 30 J.L. & ECON. 265, 269 (1987) (noting that “a trademark conveys · information that allows the consumer to say to himself, ‘I need not investigate · the attributes of the brand I am about to purchase because the trademark is a

suggests that a dilution law that targets only commercial uses, and ignores the host of other uses · that can influence a trademark's meaning, "irrationally targets commercial speech for a harm

The concept of trademark dilution is as controversial as it is vague. Trademark scholars are overwhelmingly critical of antidilution protection, which · appears to grant in-gross rights to owners of qualifying marks3—such that Apple · (the technology company) could use antidilution law to prevent nearly any · subsequent user from adopting the term “apple” as a trademark, even when no · consumer ...

Instead, dilution protection law aims to protect sufficiently strong trademarks from losing their singular association in the public mind with a particular product, perhaps imagined if the trademark were to be encountered independently of any product (e.g., just the word Pepsi spoken, or on ...

The main purpose of recognizing this type of dilution is to prevent the unauthorized mark from benefitting unfairly from the earlier mark’s reputation. An example of free-riding may be unauthorized use of GUCCI as a mark for a high-end restaurant. ... Famous and Well-Known Marks: An International Analysis Uniquely explores the rationale for, and the history and implementation of, the protection of these exceptional trademarks. U.S. State Trademark and Unfair Competition Law A single source for facts, analysis, and commentary on U.S.