Dash! Trademark blues as Tesco’s Tevron dismissed as “devoid of any distinctive character”
Tesco has lost its latest round with the Intellectual Property Office (IPO). The supermarket giant was hoping to trademark the blue dashes underneath the word Tesco in its logo, but the powers that be deemed the marks (known by Tesco insiders as Tevrons, our spies tell us) were too simple to represent the brand on their own.
“The mark is devoid of any distinctive character,” said the examiner. Ouch. And the experts agree. “When compared to examples like the Nike swoosh, what Tesco has failed to do is develop and protect a well-recognised logo with which to encapsulate their offering,” Tania Clark, trademark attorney at Withers & Rogers said.
This isn’t the first time Tesco has been rebuffed by the IPO. Back in December the copyright boffins deemed the word Clubcard too generic to be linked inextricably to Tesco. There was also a sizable snafu in May 2012 when the chain had to pull an entire range of its own toiletries because of a trademark infringement.
The fat lady hasn’t sung on the Tevrons as far as Tesco is concerned though.
“This is a preliminary stage of an ongoing process,” a spokesperson told us. Back in the ring.