Germany cafe Apfelkind takes a bite out of Apple in copyright fight
Apfelkind (Apple Child) is only a small cafe in the centre of a small German city, but its owner has succeeded where the Beatles failed and won a legal stand-off with the US computer giant Apple.
It is only a small cafe in the centre of a small German city, but its owner has succeeded where the Beatles failed and won a legal stand-off with the US computer giant Apple.
Apfelkind (Apple Child) is a cafe in Bonn where parents can sip lattes while children play with toys or listen to storytellers. Its logo shows the outline of a child's face within a red apple - with none of the characteristic bite marks of the electronics manufacturer's logo.
Yet when Apfelkind owner Christin Romer filed a trademark application for her company in 2011, Apple got in touch asking her to withdraw the request since customers could potentially confuse the two logos.
Romer stood firm and a two-year legal correspondence ensued. Last week Apple withdrew its objection.
The key factor that inspired Romer to fight back was a gagging clause. At first Apple had offered a compromise whereby she could use the Apfelkind logo on her own franchise products but not on any electronic equipment.
Romer said she only planned to sell branded mugs, keyrings and carrier bags, but was unhappy with a clause in the settlement stating that she could not talk about any of the correspondence between her and Apple.