Merch Traffic Claims Counterfeit | Hozier Trademark Infringement Lawsuit

The owner of the Hozier trademark, Merch Traffic, has filed a federal infringement lawsuit. The suit claims that online sellers have infringed on the Hozier trademark and sold counterfeit products to consumers. Hozier is an award-winning musician who is famous throughout the world, especially for his song “Take Me to Church.” You may have heard it! Before we get into what sellers should do in response to the Hozier trademark infringement lawsuit, let’s check out a few of the allegations:

The success of the Hozier brand has resulted in significant counterfeiting of the HOZIER Trademark. Consequently, Plaintiff has an anti-counterfeiting program and regularly investigates suspicious e-commerce stores identified in proactive Internet sweeps and reported by consumers. 

In recent years, Plaintiff has identified many fully interactive, e-commerce stores offering Counterfeit 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.

Many Defendants also deceive unknowing consumers by using the HOZIER Trademark 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 e-commerce stores relevant to consumer searches for Hozier products. 

Other e-commerce stores operating under the Seller Aliases omit using the HOZIER Trademark in the item title to evade enforcement efforts while using strategic item titles and descriptions that will trigger their listings when consumers are searching for Hozier products.  

This is a trademark infringement action against Defendants based on their unauthorized use in commerce of counterfeit imitations of the federally registered HOZIER Trademark in connection with the sale, offering for sale, distribution, and/or advertising of infringing goods. The HOZIER Trademark is a highly distinctive mark. Consumers have come to expect the highest quality from products sold or marketed under the HOZIER Trademark.  

Details of the Hozier Trademark Infringement Lawsuit 

Regardless of whether your business actually sold counterfeit Hozier branded products, you’ll want to respond to the court! The allegations themselves are reason enough for you to consider the matter as extremely serious. You’ll probably have a desire to establish that you didn’t sell infringing goods or you may want to settle with the Plaintiff. The most reasonable method to navigate this lawsuit will start with retaining an intellectual property attorney!  

Trademark lawsuits can cause online sellers a lot of stress. How can you lessen the amount of stress that you’ll have to deal with because of the lawsuit? Hire a lawyer! The owner of the Hozier trademark has alleged that the infringement on their intellectual property has led to them losing money. As such, Merch Traffic filed the lawsuit and aims to stifle that damage and loss. While the claims the Plaintiff made aren’t yet proven, you’ll still have to address them. Having an attorney work on your behalf will be the most efficient way to do so. 

Schedule A Lawsuits and Temporary Restraining Orders…

What kind of lawsuit is this? Schedule A. The Plaintiff filed a Schedule A lawsuit so they could sue many sellers for the alleged counterfeiting and infringement. The reason Merch Traffic and other major brands choose to do this is because it allows them to reach the maximum amount of settlements. Some sellers named in the suit might want to just settle directly with Merch Traffic and move on. That’s absolutely within your rights. We want to inform you, though, that the majority of settlements reached between the Plaintiff and Defendants in Schedule A suits, without a lawyer, leave sellers with just about half of the money in their frozen accounts. It’s not the best deal, really! 

Frozen account? Yes, that’s right. When Schedule A infringement lawsuits are filed the Plaintiffs often request a temporary restraining order (TRO) to be imposed on all of the Defendants’ online seller accounts. The intention behind this move is to stop any further infringement from happening. What’s so frustrating about the TRO is that it prevents sellers from accessing their accounts and the money in them. That can really harm your business! 

So, first of all you need to respond to the court once you’ve been made aware that you’re being sued. The owner of the Hozier trademark is not going to just forget about the lawsuit in the event that you choose to ignore it. The decision to act as though this lawsuit is unimportant may be extremely damaging to your own business. You could even have to contend with the very-difficult-to-overturn Default Judgment. That’s a completely avoidable result, so long as you acknowledge the reality of the lawsuit and respond! 

If you and your business are being sued for allegedly selling counterfeit Hozier branded products, you should definitely hire an intellectual property attorney. Navigating the process of responding and negotiating on your own is possible, but not exactly practical. The investment in the cost of a lawyer is nothing compared to how much it would cost if you don’t have one on your side! 

Take Action, Hire an Intellectual Property Attorney

Anyone who is suffering from the restraining order on their seller accounts needs to take action right away. The TRO can potentially place your business in the path of bankruptcy. To alleviate the trouble caused by the lawsuit, retain an attorney as soon as you can. They’ll be able to guide you through just what you need to do to properly handle the situation. If at all possible, your lawyer can also clear your business of the allegations. Where that isn’t possible, they’ll have more experience in terms of negotiating a solid settlement. 

Contact our team at Stockman & Poropat, PLLC today for a free consultation! Our attorneys can help you and your business. We can develop a creative legal solution that works for you!

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