A Mexican restaurant in London sent a warning to another of the same type for using the word taquería as part of its name, allegedly incurring in trademark infringement.
The Taqueria restaurant, which has two locations in the capital of the United Kingdom, alleges that its colleagues from the Sonora restaurant incur an infraction by using taqueria as part of its description, according to the gastronomic media Eater London.
Taqueria's attorneys sent
a 20-page letter
to Sonora owners Michelle Salazar de la Rocha and Sam Napier in early September outlining the technicalities of the alleged violation, as well as a proposal to fix the problem with September 21 as the deadline.
The word taquería, according to one specialist, is descriptive and not distinctive.
Christopher Nastri/AP
Salazar and Napier told Eater they are confident they can fight the charge, arguing that the word taqueria is generic and that its use will not necessarily cause a consumer to believe that "the services that Sonora offers under labels containing (the word) taqueria are provided by, in association with, or under the authorization of Taqueria (the restaurant)."
Ismael Munoz, Taqueria's director of operations, however, told the aforementioned outlet that "as with all UK trademark registrations, the provisions of the Trademark Law
grant the owner the exclusive right over the mark,
and those rights are infringed when the mark is used in the United Kingdom by another company without the owner's consent".
Therefore, according to Munoz, the use of taquería without the consent of the owners of the restaurant constitutes "an infringement of the brand."
"I just felt the blow," says the taco vendor who was assaulted by a woman in Los Angeles
July 7, 202201:56
One of the lawyers who contacted the owners of Sonora after they posted about what happened on their Instagram social network account explained to Napier that if a copyright is registered, it has to be non-descriptive and distinctive.
"And the use of the word taqueria is descriptive and not distinctive," Napier said.
[A Taco Bell employee pours scalding water on two female customers in Dallas]
And he added: "For [Taqueria] it is the name of a company, but
for anyone else it is descriptive
. It is to describe what your company does. And it is not distinctive, because there can be many taquerias, just as there can be many pizzerias."
For Salazar, whose family runs the Pollo Feliz chain in northern Mexico, this issue is ridiculous.
"There's no way to put it...and I guess it also reminds me of the fact that everyone thinks there's no good Mexican food in the UK. start? It's another barrier."