Stateside Sues Anheuser-Busch Over Very Familiar-Looking Drinks
We honestly thought they were the same products at first glance.
Surfside cans from Philadelphia’s Stateside Vodka next to Skimmers cans from Anheuser-Busch (photo via lawsuit exhibit)
Anheuser-Busch is the largest brewer in America, responsible for such beers as Budweiser and Bud Light, and its parent company, Anheuser-Busch InBev, owns a dizzying number of beverage brands, from Modelo and Corona to Hoegaarden and Stella Artois. But it’s Anheuser-Busch’s vodka-tea brand Skimmers, released earlier this year, that has raised the ire of Philadelphia’s own Stateside Vodka, progenitor of Surfside, the canned vodka-iced tea cocktail that is the fastest-growing alcohol brand in the country.
On Tuesday, Stateside Brands, LLC filed a lawsuit in Philadelphia’s federal court alleging that Anheuser-Busch’s Skimmers product infringes on Stateside’s trademarks related to Surfside. Stateside doesn’t dispute that Anheuser-Busch has the right to market its own brand of vodka-iced tea canned cocktails, a category that Stateside pioneered with Surfside. It is the design elements of Skimmers that Stateside maintains violate the law.
And it’s not hard to see why. Just look at the photo above to see how incredibly similar the two products look.
“Instead of competing in the [ready-to-drink] industry on a level playing field, Anheuser-Busch decided to give itself an unlawful edge in the market by designing its Skimmers product to look strikingly similar to the Surfside products,” reads the suit. “Indeed, as shown in the comparison table below, the design for the Skimmers product mimics each element of Stateside’s Surfside Trade Dress and conveys the same overall appearance and commercial impression.”
This is the comparison table included in the complaint:
(photos via lawsuit complaint)
The lawsuit cites the “stylized gradient design on the bottom third of the can comprised of layered color-shifting bands” as well as the white background that incorporates the sun on the top two-thirds of the can. And then there’s the colored rim at the top of the can that utilizes the colors used on the bottom of the can.
Stateside’s lawsuit seeks a permanent injunction against Anheuser-Busch that would force the company to change its design, as well as unspecified damages, including “any and all profits” that Anheuser-Busch has earned on the Skimmers cans.
“We believe this lawsuit is without merit and will vigorously defend against it,” an Anheuser-Busch spokesperson tells Philly Mag.
