Flash sales site NoMoreRack — Nordstrom sues
Retailer claims flash sales site is infringing its marks.
Retailing giant Nordstrom has sued flash sales site NoMoreRack.com, claiming the site’s brand and domain name infringe its trademarks (pdf).
Nordstrom owns 110 “The Rack” stores, which are essentially its outlet stores. It has trademarks for “Rack” and “The Rack”.
NoMoreRack.com is a flash sales site, offering limited time closeout sales. As stated by this article, it generated $46 million in revenue the first half of 2012.
Nordstrom states it became aware of the site earlier this year and put the firm on notice of its alleged infringement.
The firm alleges that NoMoreRack.com named its business to take advantage of Nordstrom’s famous mark:
Nordstrom is informed and believes and on that basis alleges that defendants knew when they began to operate the NoMoreRack Site that Nordstrom had invested over four decades of time, effort and money into developing in the Rack Marks a reputation for excellent client service and quality discount merchandise. NoMoreRack’s business did not have a brand identity that could possibly attract such high levels of client goodwill and name association. Thus, rather than develop goodwill in independently created trademarks, NoMoreRack simply misappropriated The Rack’s hard-won reputation.
Nordstrom is suing for trademark infringement, trademark dilution, and violation of the anticybersquatting consumer protection act. Among its demands is that the defendant’s NoMoreRack.com and FriendRack.com domain names be transferred to Nordstrom.
