'Geek Power': Best Buy Sends C&D To Newegg Over Marketing Campaign
from the oh-come-on dept
Ah, Best Buy. It's apparently decided to get into the trademark bullying business. The company sent well known online electronics retailer Newegg a cease & desist (shown below) because Newegg is running a marketing campaign called "Geek On" with the "O" in "On" made to look like a "power on" button. Best Buy claims that this is biting off its own Geek Squad logo, which similarly uses a power on button (though, with a tie):
The fake Best Buy employee is depicted as being slovenly and uninformed about computer products, in contrast to your employees who are portrayed as "experts."Of course, there are all sorts of problems with these claims. The logos looking nothing alike, as we've already discussed, but the whole thing about the TV ad is just ridiculous. There's clearly no trademark issue there, as competitors are absolutely allowed to poke fun at each other. No one is going to think that Best Buy "sponsored" the Newegg commercial. There's no consumer confusion at all. More amusingly, the fact that Best Buy thinks that Newegg is portraying Best Buy employees says a lot about how Best Buy views its own employees.
Your misuse of our valuable trademarks and your negative portrayal of our employees violate our trademark rights and misleads consumers about our services, in violation of federal and state law. While we welcome fair competition, we cannot tolerate unfair competition that disparages our employees, confuses customers and damages our valuable trademarks and the goodwill associated with those marks. We take great pride in our employees and the high quality of customer service they offer and find your company's focus on our employees in this advertising campaign to be particularly offensive.
Of course, as many are pointing out, this whole thing has done the exact opposite of what Best Buy probably wanted. First, it's driven a ton of attention to Newegg's commercial, but more importantly, it's made Newegg supporters -- who are generally quite tech savvy -- really dislike Best Buy even more than they may have already. Newegg had posted the C&D letter on its Facebook page, and the response are almost universally anti-Best Buy:
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Filed Under: cease & desist, geek squad, trademark
Companies: best buy, newegg
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Color Greed
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Re: Color Greed
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They haven't laid claim to yellow . . . yet.
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Re: Color Greed
However, when I read the headline and looked at the photo, I mixed it up and thougt the first image belonged to Best Buy, so....
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Also, cracks me up that they are claiming infringingment because the guy in the video is wearing a blue golf shirt and acting like an idiot. Idiots in blue golf shirts *must* be bestbuy! that is *our* thing, you can't have that in your video!
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Way to take a little negative marketing and make it a hundred times worse, Best Buy!
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Re:
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Posers!
That symbol is a reference to an open/closed circuit, and has been associated with the 'power button' for longer than either of them has been at this.
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(You'd) Best Buy (somewhere else)
Um, the young man in the commercial was "slovenly"? Really? In what way?
Being uninformed is pretty much the default for BB employees, with as many items as there are in the store finding the guy that actually knows about the thing you are asking about is generally quite difficult.
And the reviews on egghead arent done by the "employees" they are done by the other customers.
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Best Buy Fail.
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I used to love Best Buy but last year while checking out on their web site using my Best Buy credit card (which I'd used A LOT and always paid off quickly) and they wanted me to add yet another credit card #. That's when I said my good-bye's to Best Buy.
Haven't tried NewEgg yet, as we don't have one but off I go to find their web site. : )
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I use it often and highly recommend it. They don't always have the best price, but the price is always reasonable and the experience excellent in my opinion.
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It's nice that Newegg seems to be treating people well and growing.
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if i have the time to wait on shipping, newegg is the way i always go...
unfortunately, its pretty rare that i have the luxury to wait on shipping :(
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Lol...I like it. Well, they just got yet another customer. Thanks for the suggestions.
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Geeks will always know what they want and seek out online deals and reviews from other tech-savvy communities. But impatient people, and people without a clue will still go to Best Buy to buy stuff. And yes, even to get advice from their clueless sales staff.
Reason being, an "expert" is anyone who the customer perceives to be better informed than they are. For the average geek, a BB rep is an ill-informed, poser douche. For the average American, he is that whiz kid who knows that an Athlon is from AMD and Core is from Intel. Wow! Where did he learn it all?! Which one is better? He'll make up an answer, and the customer won't know the difference.
The BB reps, as tech illiterate as they may appear to me, can actually help a customer who is completely clueless. I've overheard simple questions like "But can I use a Linksys WiFi card on my Cisco WiFi thingy?" The BB guy will know the answer. Someone on the thread suggested going to BB to videotape how dumb the reps are. Instead, if you really want a laugh, focus the camera on how dumb the customers are.
But you'll never catch me in there buying anything. I'm an Amazon Prime addict.
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Blue Shirts
If it's for me, I wait for NewEgg's order to come in. Bare drive doesn't come with a manual or cable (or box)? Excellent, save me some money. I don't need them.
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How about that,
1. The common power indicator symbol. (Wow I wished I owned that, the revenue from licensing to PC makers must be big. Idiots)
2. The work "Geek" (I'll Call them idiots again here.)
3. Clueless computer salesmen in wait for it.. BLUE SHIRTS. (Now I'll call them dumba_____.)
No wonder I don't buy from Best Buy anymore.
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Competition
Wonder if its just advertising if if Newegg is going to start competing with GeekSquad. That could be a big deal for WorstTry and cause some execs and lawyers to go ballistic start suing.
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The "O" in the word "ON" is . . .
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well
Or suing because apparently Apple owns the entire concept of 'rounded corners'.... :)
First they came for the rounded corners, and I did nothing.
Then they came for the sharp square corners and I did nothing.
Then they came for anything with a surface (which was everything).........
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'Geek Power': Best Buy ...
I basically agree with the article, and think Best Buy made a huge mistake here.
However, the above quote shows an equally huge ignorance of the trademark law.
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Sound good?
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how about
will they step up to the challenge?
please won't somebody think of the starving best buy lawyers? :)
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Come on.
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Re: Come on.
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Re: Come on.
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If your job is to sell goods in your de3partment and your spending 8 hours per day looking at the shit you'd have to actually make a concerted effort NOT to educate yourself on its specifications.
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Funny thing that
Also, for years I have used newegg. Always wonderful. The products get here rather quickly and if anything is ever wrong, returning stuff has never been a problem.
Less than three Newegg.
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Intent is obvious
Big freakin deal. No basis for a suit unless they really used a BB type logo somewhere which they didn't on the guy's shirt etc.
The store actually looks more like the old CompUSA or TigerDirect stores before they changed them around.
The t-shirt thing...yea ok whatever I've seen that kind of logo used before in the electronics space. This is just BB trying to scare NewEgg into pulling the spots and the shirts with a threat.
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Commercial was about Best Buy?
I've worked in these type of environments too. The training is terrible, and employees are only given the "pros" of a product in which they want you to convey to the customer. They never tell you the full specs of the products you're selling.
I remember on several occasions working at staples needing to look on the tag, or even resorting to Googling information because I really didn't know anything about the product. I guess that's what happens when you're given one day of training :/
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