En vogue

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Gob
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En vogue

Post by Gob »

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One of the biggest fashion magazines in the world is threatening to sue a pub in a tiny Cornish hamlet because they share the same name - and it claims this could confuse its readers.

Condé Nast, the owner of Vogue magazine, has sent a ‘cease and desist’ letter to the Star Inn at Vogue, a hamlet that blends into St Day, near Redruth, to stop using the name ‘Vogue’ as it is their name - even though the pub is more than 200 years old and the village is older still.

The letter, which has been seen by CornwallLive, asked publicans Mark and Rachel Graham to stop using the name of the Cornish hamlet because it might confuse its fashonista readers who might not be able to differentiate between their favourite glossy magazine full of top models and a proper Cornish boozer in a village which the vast majority of them have never heard of.


“When I opened the letter I thought some bugger in the village was having me on,” Mark, the 60-year-old Truro-born publican said. “Surely these people can’t be serious. In this modern day and age someone couldn’t be bothered to go onto Google and see that Vogue is a Cornish hamlet that’s been here for hundreds of years. It seems common sense has taken a backseat on this one.”

In her letter to Mark and Rachel, in which she expresses her very grave concern that Vogue the hamlet and Vogue the magazine could become somehow mixed up in people’s minds and lead to global trade being diverted from Milan, Paris, London and New York to St Day, Condé Nast’s chief operating officer Sabine Vandenbroucke, wrote: “Our company is the proprietor of the Vogue mark, not only for its world-famous magazine first published in November 1916 but in respect of other goods and services offered to the public by our company.


“We are concerned that the name which you are using is going to cause problems because as far as the general public is concerned a connection between your business and ours is likely to be inferred.”

Ms Vandenbroucke’s letter, dated March 1, 2022, also asked Mark and Rachel to provide more information about what type of business the Star Inn Vogue pub is about and any imagery it uses to make sure it obviously can’t be confused with the magazine. At the end it adds threateningly: “Please reply within seven days or we will take remedial action.”

Mark, who thought some of his punters were having a laugh at his expense, did reply with a long missive, complete with a selection of photos of the pub and street names found in the area, bearing the name Vogue. He thinks Vogue’s confused state may have arisen when he and his wife decided to change their trading status from a partnership to a limited company and the name popped up on Companies House and suddenly Condé Nast went into a fashion flap.

In his letter to the New York publisher’s London offices, the publican said: “Whilst I found your letter interesting on the one hand, I also found it hilariously funny. I presume your magazine bases its name on the dictionary term for being in fashion which is uncapitalised as used in the Oxford English Dictionary.

“If a member of your staff had taken the time to investigate they would have discovered that our company, the Star Inn, is in the small village of Vogue, near St Day, Cornwall. Yes, that’s right, Vogue is the name of our village, which has been in existence for hundreds of years and in fact is a Cornish word, not English.

“I note in your letter that you have only been in existence since 1916 and I presume that at the time when you chose the name Vogue in the capitalised version you didn’t seek permission from the villagers of the real Vogue. I also presume that Madonna did not seek your permission to use the word Vogue (again the capitalised version) for her 1990s song of the same name.

"You are both at liberty to use the uncapitalised version without our permission. As a side note she didn’t seek our permission either.”

Mark concluded saying: “In answer to your question whether we would change our name, it is a categorical NO.”
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”

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MajGenl.Meade
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Re: En vogue

Post by MajGenl.Meade »

Bit vague, eh?
For Christianity, by identifying truth with faith, must teach-and, properly understood, does teach-that any interference with the truth is immoral. A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts

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Bicycle Bill
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Re: En vogue

Post by Bicycle Bill »

My only concern is that Conde-Nast would decide to pursue this with legal actions and filings.  My only question is, where would these be filed?

If they had to file in Cornwall, the magistrate would probably entertain the filing and then, after have been sufiiciently entertained, would find it funny and laugh it right out of court.  However, if C-N could bring action through courts elsewhere, such as NYC in America — where corporations have even more rights than adult white females — he could find himself fighting an expensive war of attrition.

And it's happened before.  Roughly twenty years ago, Starbucks, the designer coffee mega-chain, filed suit alleging trademark infringement against a small coffee shop/cafe in Canada called "HaidaBucks".  This stand-alone shop was being run by — wait for it — members of the indigenous peoples known as the Haidas.  To say the least, a significant uproar ensued, and Starbucks eventually backed down ... not because it was the right thing to do, not because they suddenly came to their senses, but because they feared the effect the adverse publicity would have on their own business.
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Gob
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Re: En vogue

Post by Gob »

Now Condé Nast has admitted it may have been a bit hasty with its use of legal threats and should have made better use of the Google search engine instead.

Christopher P. Donnellan, from Condé Nast Publications Limited's legal department, has now written another letter to Mark and Rachel confirming that when the couple changed their legal trading status from a partnership to a limited company and the name Star Inn Vogue popped up on Companies House, they got all aflutter.

He said: "Many thanks for your letter dated March 15, 2022 and for responding with more information about your business and the hamlet of Vogue. We were grateful for your response and to learn more about your business in this beautiful part of our country.

"I am sure you will appreciate why we regularly monitor use of the name Vogue, including at Companies House (which is how we were alerted to your company name). However, you are quite correct to note that further research by our team would have identified that we did not need to send such a letter on this occasion.

"Everyone at Conde Nast wishes you and everyone in Vogue best wishes for a happy summer, and for your upcoming “American Night” on May 18."

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornw ... ll-7079110
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”

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Econoline
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Re: En vogue

Post by Econoline »

People who are wrong are just as sure they're right as people who are right. The only difference is, they're wrong.
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Big RR
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Re: En vogue

Post by Big RR »

Bill--as I recall, the UK has specific trademark courts to bring infringement actions and get injunctions to prevent continued infringement. Wile it may seem frivolous, policing of trademarks is deadly serious as trademarks can only exist when they are distinctive and recognizable by the public; if they cease to be so because they are widely used by others than the owner of the mark, the mark can be cancelled by the trademark authorities. The history of trademarks is full of many marks which have been cancelled (usually being ruled to be generic for the products) or abandoned because the distinctiveness has been lost and use by the company is no longer worthwhile. When you consider how much is invested to promote marks by the business, the loss and be considerable. Another concern is not that the use is broad, but the the use of the mark by the infringer could reflect poorly on the trademark owner. In any event, it is incumbent on a trademark owner to police and enforce its mark to avoid loss. Early in my career, I would write this sort of letter for clients, and mostly the persons just stopped the use (saying they didn't know it was a trademark or agreed to limit the use of the mark to avoid the problems; court action (or action in the trademark office) was quite rare. Here the system worked as it should and the response even prompted an apology.

And, FWIW, trademarks perform an important service for consumers, guaranteeing they are purchasing the product from the mark owner; if I buy Cheerios in the store, I will always get the same cereal because the owner of the mark wants me to keep buying it; if there are dozens of Cheerios (sor similar sounding) brands on the shelf, I would have no idea what I am buying. the government doesn't have the resources to monitor vendors to determine what is sold (other than in safety and health concerns), so the burden is placed with the mark owner who has the most to lose if the mark is improperly used. It's a system that generally works without the courts very much, and relies on the good will of the parties.

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