Kronthal Waters, Ltd. v. Becker

Citations

• 137 F. 649
• 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 5009

Syllabus

<p>1. Unfair Competition—Distinctive Dressing—Transfer of Right by Sale of Business and Good Will.</p> <p>Although the name under which an article is sold may be one which cannot be appropriated as a technical trade-mark, yet where it has been used for many years in connection with a style of package and labels which together constitute a distinctive dressing for the article, by which it has become well known to the trade and to consumers, the right to the exclusive use of such dressing is one which passes with the sale of the assets and good will of the business, and in which the purchaser is entitled to protection against a fraudulent imitation.</p> <p>[Ed. Note.—For cases in point, see vol. 46, Cent. Dig. Trade-Marks and Trade-Names, § 98.</p> <p>. Unfair competition, see notes to Scheuer v. Muller, 20 C. C. A. 165; Lare v. Harper, 30 C. C. A. 376.]</p> <p>3. Same—Imitation of Dressing.</p> <p>Complainant and its predecessors in ownership have for many years bottled and sold the waters of a well-known mineral spring in Germany under the name “Blue Label,” using therefor a uniform and distinctive dressing consisting of a green bottle' having thereon a blue neck label of peculiar shape, bearing the words “Blue Label,” and a body label containing an elliptical blue panel with white lettering surrounded by a white field with blue lettering. Such water became widely known throughout the United States under the name of “Blue Label Mineral Water.” Defendant commenced the bottling and sale of a different water, using bottles of the same shape, size, and color, having thereon neck and body labels of the same shape size, style, and colors, but having different words thereon, the resemblances between the two as a whole being much more noticeable to a person of ordinary intelligence and observation than the differences, and such as were calculated and evidently intended to deceive ordinary purchasers. Held, that such simulation of complainant’s ' dressing, aside from any que