E-Commerce Sellers Sued by Collegiate Licensing Company (CLC)

Collegiate Licensing Company (CLC) has filed a trademark infringement lawsuit! According to CLC, counterfeit versions of their licensed products were sold on the marketplace. The online sellers who allegedly offered these goods are the ones being sued. As stated in the legal complaint, the trademark infringement was carried out by one or more than one of the many Defendants named in the lawsuit. These sellers are all getting sued at the same time because this is a Schedule A lawsuit, which allows for that. 

Interestingly, CLC is a “trademark licensing and enforcement agent that represents more than 700 colleges, universities, bowl games, collegiate athletic conferences and other brands, including the University of Alabama, the University of Kansas, and the University of Michigan.” Schedule A lawsuits more typically get filed by big commercial brands, like Nike, Toyota, the NBA, Harley-Davidson, and so on. In this case, it’s a company that facilitates the licensing and enforcement of trademarks for colleges and related brands. CLC contends that the online sellers who committed the infringement sold unauthorized products that are trademark protected. Those products include apparel, caps, jerseys, and more. 

CLC Claims Sellers Offered Unauthorized Goods to Consumers

CLC claims that their revenue is generated through the sale of their authorized collegiate goods. And, due to the selling of unauthorized, counterfeit products by the Defendants, the CLC has been “significantly damaged” and they have suffered “financial and irreparable harm.” Further, the Plaintiff asserts that their clients own the trademarks in question and collaborate with CLC when addressing licensing and protection of the intellectual property. That goes for trademarks, names, symbols, trade dress colors, designs, emblems, and logos. 

If you’ve received notice that your online business is getting sued as part of the CLC lawsuit, you should hire an intellectual property attorney immediately! Stressing out over the existence of the lawsuit and/or panicking because you’re not sure what to do – that’s unnecessary. An attorney can walk you through the legal process of handling this matter step by step. Ultimately, they’ll get your business back on its feet so that you can continue on your path of success. 

Per the lawsuit, the Defendants have been identified as businesses and/or individuals who run online stores under several “seller aliases.” So far as the Plaintiff believes, these sellers are based in China or other places outside the United States. From these locations, it’s alleged that the Defendants have sold various CLC protected products and infringed on those properties. 

The Allegations of Trademark Infringement…

The allegations of trademark infringement, in part, read as follows:

The fame of CLC Protected Trademarks and affiliated variety of licensed products, including apparel, hats, jewelry, toys, furniture, pennants, and bags, among others (collectively, the “Genuine CLC Products”), has resulted in significant counterfeiting of CLC Protected Trademarks. 

In addition to other significant enforcement measures, CLC is a member of the Coalition to Advance the Protection of Sports Logos (“CAPS”), which is administered by Trademark Management LLC. CAPS has created an extensive anti-counterfeiting program, which includes regularly investigating suspicious e-commerce stores identified in proactive Internet sweeps and reported by a variety of informants in response to the significant counterfeiting of CLC Protected Trademarks.

Defendants concurrently employ and benefit from substantially similar advertising and marketing strategies. For example, Defendants facilitate sales of Counterfeit Products by designing the e-commerce stores operating under the Seller Aliases so that they appear to unknowing consumers to be authorized online retailers, outlet stores, or wholesalers, including, in many instances, by copying the layouts, terms of service, legal notices and/or contact information found on the websites of Plaintiff’s authorized online retailers.

Many Defendants also deceive unknowing consumers by using one or more CLC Protected Trademarks without authorization within the content, text, and/or meta-tags of their e- commerce stores to attract various search engines crawling the Internet looking for websites relevant to consumer searches for Genuine CLC Products. 

The CLC Counterfeit Lawsuit is “Schedule A”

As we mentioned, this is a Schedule A infringement lawsuit. In most of these cases, the Plaintiff tries to settle directly with as many Defendants as they can. Maybe you or another named seller will want to take a direct settlement, so you can quickly resolve this issue. While the speed of that decision may be attractive, the outcome might not be! Most Schedule A direct settlements leave the Defendants with less than what they deserve. 

Here’s how it works. After the Plaintiff files the lawsuit, they’ll request that the court approve a temporary restraining order (TRO). After that’s approved, the sellers’ online accounts will be frozen by the TRO. The Defendants will then be blocked from accessing the money in their seller accounts. The reason behind the Plaintiff’s decision to get a restraining order is so that they can stop the alleged counterfeiting. The byproduct of the TRO is that the Defendants are put into a tough financial position. To both survive the lawsuit and thereafter thrive as a business, you’ll want to hire an intellectual property attorney! 

For any affected seller who is considering ignoring the lawsuit, please don’t! You need to respond to the lawsuit. And, figure out an effective legal strategy for settlement or negotiation, so that your business can move forward. That’s why having an intellectual property attorney on your side is so essential. They can take care of everything you and your business requires to get past this roadblock. 

Contact our team at Stockman & Poropat, PLLC today for a free consultation! We’re eager to learn about your particular situation so that we can develop a tailor-made legal solution just for you. 

Download the legal complaint below:

Up next we will be discussing the latest Nike Trademark Infringement Lawsuit.