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13 March 2017Trademarks

Survival kit makers in trademark war

PrepareMe America, a maker of emergency survival kits, has taken on a rival in a trademark infringement and trade secrets claim.

Filed at the US District Court for the Western District of Washington on Wednesday, March 8, the claim alleged that a former employee of PrepareMe America had taken trade secrets and set up a rival business called Survival Prep Warehouse.

PrepareMe said the defendant was employed by the company between December 2012 and October 2013 and had signed a confidentiality agreement.

The defendant’s husband (who is also named in the lawsuit) is alleged to have registered the  survivalprepwarehouse.com domain name while the defendant was still employed.

“In approximately August of 2013, while defendant was still employed by PrepareMe America, defendant used vendor lists and contact information obtained from PrepareMe America to contact PrepareMe America’s suppliers,” said the suit.

It added that the defendant didn’t contact the suppliers about any “legitimate job” for PrepareMe America.

In September 2013, the defendant opened an account with the Washington Department of Revenue under the name Survival Prep Warehouse, and in 2015 former a company.

The claim said: “Defendants market and sell emergency supply products in direct competition with PrepareMe America.”

It added that Survival Prep Warehouse had designed its emergency supply products to “mimic” the products sold by PrepareMe America.

According to the claim, PrepareMe has been selling emergency supply products using the ‘Perfect Survival Kit’ trademark since 2011.

In July 2015, the US Patent and Trademark Office issued trademark registration number 4,772,008 to PrepareMe America for the ‘Perfect Survival Kit’ trademark.

Survival Prep Warehouse is alleged to have sold products under the ‘Perfect Survival Kit’ and ‘Survival Kit Perfect’ trademarks.

In December 2016,  Amazon.com, the marketplace the goods are being sold on, removed the defendants’ allegedly infringing listings after notification from PrepareMe America.

This process was repeated a number of times during December 2015 and January this year.

“Defendants have marketed their emergency supply products to directly compete with and siphon sales away from the emergency supply products sold by PrepareMe America,” said the suit.

PrepareMe America is seeking an order that the defendants return trade secrets, the destruction of the trade secrets, injunctive relief, triple damages, statutory damages, attorneys’ fees and a jury trial.

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