Posted on Friday 12 September 2008
An article in today’s LA Times reports that Pinkberry is filing lawsuits against six frozen yogurt chains across the country. Pinkberry is charging them with copying elements of their brand (logo, store layout). Pinkberry has a right to protect their brand image, but is this going too far to take advantage of the little guys that in no way can compete? Pinkberry is growing into a powerful empire, and they have the funding to back themselves up.
We’ve been to one of the stores that is being charged ‘Peachy’ yogurt, who in fact changed their name after being served a ceast-and-desist letter. I suppose that tiny logo above the Peachy looks similar to Pinkberry’s logo.
The problem we see is how do they regulate who to pick and choose to take action against. There are so many stores out there that take elements from each other. Pinkberry seems to be fighting an uphill battle, or they will scare all of the other wannabe’s into oblivion.