Because of the trademark registration, Michelle Ice City Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Michelle Ice City") once again sued the State Intellectual Property Office. Red Star Capital Bureau noted that on October 12, 2021, a trademark dispute between Michelle Ice City and the State Intellectual Property Office was heard at the Beijing Intellectual Property Court.
On June 17 this year, Michelle Ice City lost the dispute over the "Snow King" trademark of Class 32. Red Star Capital Bureau has learned that the 32 types of trademarks mainly involve the patent rights of water, beverages and other non-alcoholic beverages, which are closely related to the main products of Michelle Ice City.
If the lawsuit for such trademarks fails again, where will the commercial layout of the "Snow King" of Mi Xue Ice City go?
Michelle Ice City Store Image source: Visual China
The lawsuit against the State Intellectual Property Office was lost
Can Honey Snow Ice City continue to use the "Snow King"?
Red Star Capital Bureau learned from the Beijing Court Trial Information Network that on the afternoon of October 12, 2021, the trademark dispute between Michelle Ice City and the State Intellectual Property Office was heard at the Beijing Intellectual Property Court.
On October 12, 2021, the administrative dispute between Michelle Ice City and the State Intellectual Property Office was held
This is not the first time that Michelle Ice City has had an administrative dispute with the State Intellectual Property Office over trademarks.
On March 25, 2020, Michelle Ice City applied for the 32nd class trademark "Snow King", which was later rejected by the State Intellectual Property Office, and then Michelle Ice City applied for rejection for review. On January 28, 2021, the State Intellectual Property Office again rejected the review.
On June 17, Michelle Ice City sued the State Intellectual Property Office. According to the judgment disclosed on October 3, the "Snow King" trademark applied for by Mi xue bingcheng in 2020 and the citation trademark are similar in terms of word composition, call, meaning, etc., and the Beijing Intellectual Property Court found it to be a similar trademark and rejected Mi Xue Bingcheng's litigation claim.
The application for registration of the "Snow King" trademark in the dispute was rejected, and the first instance of the "Snow King" trademark was rejected, and the first instance of the case was lost by The Snow Ice City.
After the loss of the trademark dispute, if Michelle Ice City does not file an appeal, or still loses the lawsuit after the appeal, can Michelle Ice City continue to use "Snow King"? In this regard, Red Star Capital Bureau consulted relevant lawyers.
Gong Junjie, a lawyer at Tahota Law Firm, told Red Star Capital that the purpose of registering a trademark is only to obtain trademark rights, and its role is to prohibit others from infringing on their own trademarks, not that they cannot be used without registration.
Gong Junjie said that what was rejected in this case was the 32nd class Snow King trademark, that is, this trademark cannot be used in the fields within the scope of the 32 types of trademarks, such as: fruit juice; water (beverage); fruit-made tea flavored soft drinks. If other sections have been successfully registered, there is no problem with using them within the scope of the successful application.
Fu Jian, a lawyer at Henan Yulong Law Firm, said that if Mi Xue Bingcheng lost the lawsuit in the final trial, then it is possible that Mi Xue Bingcheng will continue to use it without obtaining the legal authorization of the trademark owner.
Red Star Capital Bureau also noted that in the litigation claims submitted by Michelle Ice City, it was repeatedly mentioned that the disputed trademark had a certain degree of popularity through the use of Michelle Ice City. So if Michelle Ice City continues to appeal, can it use the trademark priority defense? Fu Jian believes that whether Mi Xue Bingcheng can use the trademark priority defense needs to be seen whether it meets one of the two conditions stipulated by law.
It is worth noting that before the Mi xue bingcheng repeatedly sued the State Intellectual Property Office, all of which ended in defeat.
On August 31, a month and a half after the first-instance defeat, Michelle Ice City reapplyed for the "Snow King" trademark for the sale of category 35 advertisements. According to the Tianyancha APP, the current trademark status is awaiting substantive review.
In addition, Michelle Ice City also changed its mind and applied for a number of graphic trademarks with the image of "Snow King", and the trademarks of "Changeable Snow King" and "Snow King Castle" with the words "Snow King".
The hard-won "Snow King"
Witness the three brand upgrades of Michelle Ice City
Many times to compete for the "Snow King" trademark, and the brand setting of Michelle Ice City is not unrelated.
According to the "Brand History" of the official website of Michelle Ice City, from 2011 to 2019, the brand image of Michelle Ice City has undergone three comprehensive upgrades.
Before 2018, Michelle Ice City has been gradually occupying the sinking market with a low-key "rural encirclement of the city" route, and the milk tea freedom that can be easily achieved for 2 yuan ice cream, 3 yuan lemonade, and 5 yuan can be easily realized... It has brought a rapidly expanding façade to The Ice City.
The image change of The Michelle Ice City store also records the brand upgrade road of The Honey Snow Ice City. In the third generation of stores, Michelle Ice City added a new design brand logo - a semi-closed red love logo; the fourth generation of stores tried to simplify the style and designed the door head into white characters on a gray background; the fifth generation stores re-used the red love logo, added a white background to optimize and upgrade, and set the red and white brand color.
In November 2018, after sales and stores reached a certain scale, Michelle Ice City began to put expanding brand awareness on the agenda. Michelle Ice City cooperated with marketing company Hua & Hua to add an IP image "Snow King". "Snow King" appeared in the door of the sixth generation of stores with a white snowman wearing a crown, a red cape and an ice cream cone scepter, which has become the unified image of the current public perception of The Ice City.
In November 2018, the new IP image "Snow King" was added according to the official website of Mi xue ice city
Since then, from the brand image to the store design and the material periphery, Michelle Ice City has all been formulated around the "Snow King" symbol, and even after the store closes, it can see the huge "Snow King" on the roller shutter.
Since then, Michelle Ice City has expanded its commercial territory with the "Snow King". According to the official website, the number of Michelle Ice City stores in 2018 was 7500, and by October 2021, the number of Global Stores of Michelle Ice City has exceeded 10,000. In 2020, Michelle Ice City achieved sales performance of 6.5 billion yuan, and the sales target for 2021 is 10 billion yuan.
The "hi tea" has sunk one after another
Mi Xue Ice City's internal and external troubles
In June 2021, the "Snow King" suddenly caught fire. With the 13-character brainwashing divine comedy, The Snow Ice City and the dancing "Snow King" have become the strongest "new top stream" in the milk tea industry this year.
Honey Snow Ice City emoji quickly became popular According to the official website of Honey Snow Ice City
However, the Honey Snow Ice City, which has flow in hand, still has internal and external troubles.
Internally, in addition to the brand core "Snow King" still in the trademark dispute, Michelle Ice City is also caught in a food safety storm.
In May 2021, according to the China Quality News Network, several Mixue Ice City stores had hidden dangers such as tampering with the date label of ingredients, arbitrarily changing the "validity tracking card", illegal use of overnight ingredients, and not cleaning the lemon skin. In October, the Beijing Consumers Association released a list of catering enterprises with food safety problems in Beijing recently, of which Michelle Ice City ranked fifth among the problematic catering enterprises, with a total of 8 stores experiencing food safety problems.
Externally, Mixue Ice City, which specializes in cultivating third- and fourth-tier cities, is still facing the dilemma of market saturation, and the "Xicha" have begun to enter the sinking market. For example, Heytea hatched Xixiao tea and Xi vials, priced between 6-15 yuan, which is half cheaper than Xicha.
However, The Capital Action of Honey Snow Ice City itself is also continuous.
At the beginning of 2021, the first round of financing of Michelle Ice City was completed, jointly led by Dragon Ball Capital and Hillhouse Group, with an investment of 1 billion yuan each. After this round of financing, The valuation of Michelle Ice City exceeded 20 billion yuan, even exceeding the valuation of Xicha's 13 billion yuan.
On September 13, Snow King Investment Co., Ltd., which is 100% owned by Mi Xue Ice City, was established, mainly responsible for the investment activities of Mi Xue Ice City. Red Star Capital Bureau found that as of October 12, 2021, Michelle Ice City held shares in 6 companies with the name of "Snow King" enterprise, including Snow King Investment Co., Ltd.
In October, the news that Michelle Ice City was about to impact the A-share listing came. According to the Henan Securities Regulatory Bureau, Mixue Bingcheng Co., Ltd. is receiving counseling from GF Securities and filed a counseling filing with the Bureau on September 29. If the IPO goes smoothly, the market is expected to usher in the "second share of milk tea" after Nai Xue's tea.
However, in addition to solving the trademark problem, how to ensure food safety, how to deal with market competition, and hand over satisfactory financial data to investors are the keys it needs to face.
Red Star News reporter Yu Yao intern reporter Cai Xiaoyi
Responsible editor Ren Zhijiang Editor Tao Yueyang
(Download Red Star News, there are prizes for the newspaper!) ）