Louis Vuitton Sues Hyundai Over A Louis Vuitton Basketball

from the do-morons-in-a-hurry-play-basketball? dept

Yesterday, I saw that Marty Schwimmer had posted a link to a Hyundai commercial asking if anyone saw the "lawsuit" in the commercial: It took me a second viewing before I spotted it. The commercial itself plays on the idea of "what if everyone could experience luxury items" showing various examples of "luxury" items being used in more everyday settings: yachts in driveways, cops eating caviar and... some guys shooting hoops with a "luxury" basketball using the typical Louis Vuitton markings that you see on LV purses/handbags/etc.

Louis Vuitton is notoriously (and ridiculously) aggressive when it comes to trademark infringement. A couple years back we wrote about LVMH (parent company of Louis Vuitton) suing a Darfur fundraiser for creating a t-shirt of a Darfur victim "pimped out" to look like Paris Hilton, including a designer handbag with symbols made to look like the LV symbols.

So, yes, that's exactly what this lawsuit is about. DSchneider points us to the Consumerist's article laying out the details and I've embedded the lawsuit filing below: Frankly, this lawsuit is ridiculous. LVMH is claiming that people might be confused? In what world? Seriously. In what world is anyone going to view the Hyundai commercial and think that it implies any kind of LVMH endorsement of Hyundai. It's a joke -- and any moron in a hurry knows that the LV basketball isn't a sign that LVMH is working with or endorsing Hyundai.

Filed Under: basketball, commercial, louis vuitton, luxury, trademark
Companies: hyundai, lvmh