Online Sellers Sued by Fear of God For Trademark Infringement
Fear of God, the streetwear and accessories brand, has filed a federal lawsuit! The Fear of God federal infringement lawsuit concerns the company’s trademarks. What they claim is that online sellers have formed a network aimed at offering counterfeit goods. As seen in the legal complaint, Fear of God holds the belief that the Defendants have willfully infringed on their intellectual property. This type of lawsuit is also known as a “Schedule A” suit – meaning, multiple sellers are being sued at once.
More specifically, Fear of God’s allegations of trademark infringement center around the sellers’ identities. The Plaintiff’s contention is that the Defendants deliberately organize their activities so their identities are unclear.
Allegations of Trademark Infringement by Fear of God
Here’s more information on those claims, excerpted from the legal complaint itself:
Tactics used by Defendants to conceal their identities and the full scope of their operation make it virtually impossible for Plaintiff to discover Defendants’ true identities and the exact interworking of their counterfeit network. If Defendants provide additional credible information regarding their identities, Plaintiff will take appropriate steps to amend the Complaint.
Fear of God has identified many fully interactive, e-commerce stores offering counterfeit Fear of God Products on online marketplace platforms such as Amazon, eBay, AliExpress, Alibaba, Wish.com, Walmart, Etsy, DHgate, and Temu, including the e-commerce stores operating under the Seller Aliases.
Defendants have targeted sales to Illinois residents by setting up and operating e- commerce stores that target United States consumers using one or more Seller Aliases, offer shipping to the United States, including Illinois, accept payment in U.S. dollars and/or funds from U.S. bank accounts, and, on information and belief, have sold Counterfeit Fear of God Products to residents of Illinois.
Many Defendants also deceive unknowing consumers by using the FEAR OF GOD 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 Fear of God Products.
What’s the Most Sensible Move? Hire an Attorney!
What’s the most sensible move a seller can make when they’ve learned that Fear of God is suing them? Hire an intellectual property attorney! With a lawyer in your corner, you can prepare a proper response to the lawsuit. From that point, you may wish to engage in negotiations with Fear of God. Some of the named sellers might have to prove their identity to the Plaintiff to clear themselves of the allegations. Across the board, your lawyer will be an incredibly valuable resource that you can rely on. As we mentioned, this is a federal trademark infringement lawsuit. Your business, your money, your reputation – all are affected. Consider the investment in a lawyer as a means to actually save your money. Sellers will find that working with an attorney to find a reasonable outcome is the way to approach the situation.
What sellers may also find is that Fear of God may attempt to settle. That is to say, settle with the sellers themselves, not by way of their attorney. This is why having a lawyer is so essential. The temporary restraining order in effect because of the lawsuit will put pressure on some of the Defendants. You can settle with Fear of God yourself, without a lawyer, but you may lose out. What do we mean by that? The settlements that sellers make directly with brands aren’t usually as fair as they should be. It’s been reported that these kinds of settlements hover at around 60% of the money impacted by the restraining order. Want to move on from the restraining order, keep a healthy amount of your money, and get back to selling? Hire a lawyer.
How a Temporary Restraining Order Can Hurt Your Business
There’s little doubt that some of the sellers will be harmed by the temporary restraining order. Fear of God requested that the court approve such a measure because of the alleged infringement. Are the allegations completely accurate to every single named seller? That hasn’t been proven yet. For some, the answer may be yes, for others, no. No matter the details, because of the claims and the federal lawsuit, sellers are feeling the squeeze.
If you’re a Defendant in the Fear of God trademark lawsuit, don’t ignore the realities. This isn’t capable of being ignored without consequence. The Plaintiff intends to halt your e-commerce operation so they can stop losing money. If you feel that the claims against the Defendants are inaccurate, seek legal counsel. Building an e-commerce business is very difficult. The path to success as an online seller isn’t always straightforward, either. Consider this Fear of God lawsuit a challenge. To rise to the occasion, seek the necessary help that will propel your business into the future with enough resources to thrive.
Contact our team at Stockman & Poropat, PLLC today for a free initial consultation!
Download the legal complaint below:
Up next we will be discussing the latest Harley-Davidson Federal Counterfeit Lawsuit.
