Seattle Trademark Lawyer

When things are slow in Seattle, STL looks elsewhere for trademark law cases worth reporting. Now is one of those times. Fortunately, Seattle University law student Michael Rice — who publishes the software-oriented Coderights law blog in his spare time — put me onto a new dispute out of the Eastern District of North Carolina. Skin care product maker Burt’s Bees, Inc., has sued rival Beenaturals, Inc., for trademark and trade dress infringement, dilution, and unfair competition. Burt’s alleges that Beenaturals is “copying or imitating marks identical or confusingly similar to Plaintiff’s BABY BEE^® word mark, bee and hive design marks, and trade dress, and displaying the same alone or in combination on packaging and other promotional materials for Defendant’s line of natural skin care and related products.” The focus of Burt’s complaint is Beenaturals’ “Bebe bee” products.

On January 19, Beenaturals removed the case from Wake County superior court. It denies consumer confusion is likely and alleges it created and adopted its trademarks in good faith and without any intent to trade on Burt’s reputation. 

The case is captioned as Burt’s Bees, Inc. v. Beenaturals, Inc., No. 07-cv-00018-D (E.D.N.C.).