The above advertising billboard is plastered all over the Twin Cities at the moment, and it got me thinking, so here I am, once again, writing about Coke Zero, remember this can?
Coke obtained a favorable decision from the TTAB early last year, ruling that ZERO is not generic for a soft drink category, instead it is descriptive and Coke has secondary meaning in it.
So, why on earth has Coke positioned SUGAR immediately next to the word ZERO beneath the Coca-Cola script in widespread billboard advertising and packaging?
Putting the key trademark issue aside, it doesn’t even look like there is a good business case for it?
Had the above billboard advertisement and depicted bottle been part of the TTAB case decided last year, instead of specimens like the above can, seems probable we’d have seen a different result.
Has Coke forgotten that like functionality for non-traditional trademarks, genericness can be raised as a validity challenge for word marks, at any time?
Coke Zero, welcome to the Genericide Watch.
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