The CUVÉE FORET trademark is likely to be confused with the Community trademark LAFORET and must be removed from the register. This was established by the Swedish Court of Patent Appeals (CPA) in a decision on 19 May 2011, when the Court thus accepted Gulliksson’s arguments in the appeal lodged in June 2009. Unlike the Swedish Patent and Registration Office, the CPA held in favour of Gulliksson and the French trademark owner’s position. The CUVÉE designation in the later trademark must be considered descriptive of wines, since it can be translated as vat, batch, grape harvest or vintage, and the words FORET and LAFORET are both phonetically and visually similar. Read the entire decision (in Swedish) here.
SA Maison Joseph Drouhin registered LAFORET for products in Class 33 for wines, spirits and liqueurs in 2006. The Patent and Registration Office rejected the opposition when Domaine Wines & Spirits of Stockholm AB three years later applied to register CUVÉE FORÊT in Sweden.
