sutton044

Mad Dogg Athletics, based in California, is a company that markets various sporting equipment, including bicycles, men’s and women’s apparel, shoes, accessories, and functional training equipment, online. Since 2000 the company has been also the proprietor of the EU word mark SPINNING for goods and services in Classes, 9 (audio and video cassettes), 28 (exercise equipment), and 41 (exercise training) of the Nice Classification. In 2012 Aerospinning Master Franchising, a company from the Czech Republic, filed an application with the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) for revocation of the SPINNING word mark, pursuant to Article 58(1)(b) of Regulation 2017/1001 (the EU Trade Mark Regulation ). The basis for the claim was that SPINNING had become the common name for the ‘exercise equipment’ and the ‘exercise training’ services in question, that is indoor cycling. In 2016 the Fifth Board of Appeal of the EUIPO revoked Mad Dogg Athletics’ rights to the word mark SPINNING fo...

Nusret Gökçe, nicknamed Salt Bae (the applicant), is a Turkish chef who owns ‘Nusr-Et’, a chain of steak houses. His art of cooking and preparing meat has become somewhat of an internet sensation [see here and here for some salty videos]. Salt Bae became widely known in 2017 for the way he ‘elegantly’ cuts meat and sprinkles salt. In particular, his fame comes from a viral video, ‘Ottoman Steak’, posted in January 2017 on his Twitter account. It has been viewed 10 million times on Instagram. After that Gökçe was dubbed ‘Salt Bae’ because of his iconic way of sprinkling salt by letting salt fall down on his forearm then spread on the meat.  In March 2017 the applicant sought to register the following motion mark as an EU trade mark: The application was for certain goods and services in Classes 25 (clothing, trousers, jackets, overcoats, skirts, suits), 30 (coffee, cocoa, artificial coffee, coffee-based beverages, noodles, macaroni, ravioli, bread, pastry and bakery product...