Adidas has withdrawn its request to block a trademark application by Black Lives Matter (BLM) for a design featuring three parallel stripes. The German sportswear company did not provide a reason for the withdrawal, but a spokesperson said that Adidas would withdraw its opposition to BLM’s trademark application as soon as possible.
Earlier on Monday, Adidas filed a statement with the US Trademark Office stating that BLM’s design would create confusion with Adidas’s branding, which has been in use for more than 70 years. The statement claimed that the BLM design incorporated three stripes in a way that was confusingly similar to Adidas’s three-stripe mark in appearance and overall commercial impression.
BLMGNF applied for a US trademark for a yellow three-striped design in November 2020, which it wants to use on its merchandise. However, Adidas argued that the design had gained “international fame and tremendous public recognition” and would lead to confusion among consumers. Adidas claimed that consumers would assume that the goods and services with the BLM design originated from the same source or were affiliated, connected, associated, or sponsored by Adidas.
BLMGNF was founded in 2013 in response to the killing of Trayvon Martin and gained worldwide attention during the protests against the killing of George Floyd in 2020.
In an unrelated case, earlier this year, Adidas lost a court case against luxury brand Thom Browne, which it had filed to stop the brand from using a four-stripe design that Adidas claimed was extremely similar to its three stripes.
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