TRADE-MARKS--UNFAIR COMPETITION--RIGHT OF EXCLUSIVE SELLING AGENT

Authors

Abstract

Plaintiff corporation is a retailer and importer of denture -blanks and is the exclusive American selling agent of the German company which makes them. The blanks are stamped with the trade-mark '"Heckolith," which is registered by the German maker in Germany and in the United States. The plaintiff, after putting the blanks through a secret aging process, places them on the market in distinctive boxes, which it marks with the word, "Hecolite," the Anglicized form of the German trade-mark. The plaintiff registered the mark "Hecolite" as his own, and also the mark "Heckolith," after a purported assignment of the mark by the German company. Defendant, with knowledge of plaintiff's business, bought the blanks in Germany and injured the plaintiff's business by underselling him in this country. Plaintiff claims the right to an accounting on two theories, (1) statutory action based on ownership of the two trade-marks, and (2) unfair competition. Held, that the plaintiff is not entitled to an accounting based on a theory of ownership of the mark as the assignment of the German mark "Hecolith" was not valid because it was not certified to be correctly acknowledged under German law, and it was not possible to register the word "Hecolite" under the statute as it was merely a translation of the word "Heckolith" which was already registered in the name of the Germany company; that plaintiff is entitled to an accounting on a theory of unfair competition since the plaintiff had made the blanks a superior article which it sells under a "get up of its own," and which the American trade has come to expect when "Hecolite" is offered. Perry v. American Hecolite Denture Corp., (C. C. A. 8th, 1935) 78 F. (2d) 556.

Recommended Citation

TRADE-MARKS--UNFAIR COMPETITION--RIGHT OF EXCLUSIVE SELLING AGENT, 34 Mich. L. Rev. 581 (1936).
Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol34/iss4/22