Patagonia Beer? Why the Clothing Company Is Suing Anheuser-Busch Patagonia Beer? Why the Clothing Company Is Suing Anheuser-Busch

Patagonia Beer? Why the Clothing Company Is Suing Anheuser-Busch

The beer also includes a silhouette of a mountain

By Karl Utermohlen, InvestorPlace Writer Apr 11, 2019, 3:29 pm EDT April 11, 2019

Patagonia beer may sound like it would be extremely profitable to the outdoors apparel brand, but these brews are being sold by Anheuser-Busch (NYSE:BUD), which has led Patagonia to file a lawsuit against the Budweiser parent company.

The clothing company decided to file a lawsuit after discovering that Anheuser-Busch has been selling a Patagonia-branded beer that also contains the latter’s environmentally friendly logo. The beer giant received the trademark to begin selling Patagonia beer in the U.S. in 2012, but the company sat on the name until 2018, which is when it started selling beer with the branding.

Patagonia is accusing Anheuser-Busch of trademark infringement as the company claims the latter copied the brand’s name and aesthetic. The Patagonia beer packaging has a silhouette of a mountain to go along with the word Patagonia in bold lettering.

Making matter worse is that Patagonia claims that Anheuser-Busch has been selling the beer and the clothing company’s branded apparel at pop-up stores at ski resorts, which is technically Patagonia clothing territory, according to the suit.

“In short, AB has done everything possible to make it appear as though this PATAGONIA beer is sold by Patagonia.” The company added that Anheuser-Busch “has gone as far as creating a logo that is strikingly similar to Patagonia’s famous mountain silhouette logo that has appeared continuously for decades on millions of products.”

BUD stock is up 0.7% Thursday.

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