Gee whiz! GiGi New York has some beef with Gigi Hadid and her Tommy Hilfiger collaboration. The leather-goods line sent a cease and desist letter to the American clothing brand because of the similarities in the styling of their name.
“Recognizing the obvious potential for consumer confusion, GiGi New York requested that Tommy Hilfiger cease and desist its misuse and work in partnership to prevent consumer confusion based on the misuse,” the brand said in a September 12 press release. “GiGi has common law priority rights since 2010 and owns federal trademarks for its ‘GIGI’ family of marks. Similar trademarks are held throughout Europe, and GiGi is positioned to defend them on both continents.”
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The clothing tags in the pieces of the supermodels’ line, which debuted at New York Fashion Week on September 9, includes her first name stylized with uppercase G’s and lowercase I’s, and that’s where the problem exists, in GiGi New York’s opinion. The brand “utilizes a unique upper- and lowercase treatment that Tommy Hilfiger has copied, causing additional consumer confusion, despite this typographical treatment having no history of use by its spokesperson, Gigi Hadid,” they alleged.
And aside from the name, GiGi New York longs to disassociate themselves from “the negative publicity surrounding Tommy Hilfiger’s overseas factories and their safety lapses,” as well as “Tommy Hilfiger’s promotion of synthetic leather bags [which] harms the reputation of an actual genuine leather GiGi New York bag.”
Since January 2012, GiGi New York has owned their trademark for key cases; leather and imitation-leather bags; leather bags and wallets; leather bags; suitcases; and wallets and leather cases. According to The Fashion Law, they filed an application for “GiGi” on its own shortly after Hadid’s runway show, where Taylor Swift and Martha Hunt were in attendance.
It seems like Hadid and Hilfiger are too busy enjoying their launch to be bothered. “Tommy Hilfiger has notified GiGi New York that they do not intend to recognize their rights in GiGi’s trademarked logo and are not concerned about the consumer confusion engendered by their misuse,” the statement read.
