View Single Post
Old 03-22-2010, 06:41 PM
  #4  
Favorite Fabrics
Super Member
 
Favorite Fabrics's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Orchard Park, NY (near Buffalo, which is near Niagara Falls)
Posts: 3,884
Default

You can look up the "First Sale Doctrine" to get an overview of what the laws say on this topic. So, while you can use the fabric any way you want to, that does NOT mean that you won't attract (negative) attention. Have a look at http://www.tabberone.com ... warning, some of the reading is pretty acidic!

So... if you want to use licensed fabrics, and then sell the items on the web (particularly on eBay) you may be inviting trouble. You have to be very careful, and include some wording along the lines of ... this is not an officially licensed (Disney) product nor are we affiliated in any way with (Disney).

And... you can get in trouble even without trying to, and even if the fabrics aren't licensed! Let me explain. A few years back, about five different fabric companies made "Red Hat" fabrics. And, since the whole "red hat" theme was quite popular that year, we carried most of the fabrics. One of the fabrics had a design of red hats on a purple background. So, we named it "Red Hat" fabric, to sell on our website. And, as a result, I got threatening letter from the Red Hat Ladies and a threatening e-mail from The Red Hat Society, saying that we were in violation of the Lanham Act and we were creating customer confusion etc. etc.

The thing is, none of the "red hat" fabrics were officially licensed. And, at that time, neither the Red Hat Ladies or the Red Hat Society had trademark protection for merchandise featuring red hats (though they were both trademarked as social groups). So go figure. When there's money involved, things can get ... umm... nasty.

In the end, nothing happened... except that every one of the fabric manufacturers "blinked"... and re-named their collections things like "Fifty Plus" and "Ladies who Lunch" and "Hats and Heels". And now Marcus has just released a little new group with a "red hat" theme... and they call it "Sassy".
Favorite Fabrics is offline