IPKAT RIDDLE: A STICKY PROBLEM

In OHIM v Wrigley, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) remitted Wrigley's application to register the word mark DOUBLEMINT as a trade mark for chewing gum and other goods to the Court of First Instance (CFI), after ruling at paragraph 35 that the CFI had failed to consider whether the word "doublemint" was "capable of being used by other economic operators to designate a characteristic of their goods and services". The phrase "other economic operators" attracted the IPKat's attention since the ECJ has not told us which economic operators it means. Presumably it includes other chewing gum manufacturers, but who else is included in this august category -- and how do we know which economic operators to consider? Should we just look at undertakings that deal in identical goods? Similar goods? Complementary goods? All goods?



The usual prize will be sent to the first reader who can give us a good answer to this little puzzle.



What to do once you've chewed your gum here

More than you wanted ever to know about chewing gum here, here, here and here

Another chewing gum trade mark controversy here