Starbucks wins over $500,000 lawsuit over pot smoking line
(Courtesy of GoGreenGarden)
(FoxNews.com) - Caffeine is a stimulant, cannabis is a psychoactive drug—and Starbucks doesn’t want anyone to confuse its product with something that promotes a mostly-illegal substance.
According to Law360, a U.S. District Court judge in New York has ordered an Oregon artist named James Landgraf to repay Starbucks $410,800 — $300,000 for copyright infringement, $99,000 for trademark infringement and $11,580 in attorneys’ fees — for designing a water pipe that looked way too much like the coffee company’s Frappuccino cups.
Starbucks argued that Landgraf and Hitman Glass, an e-commerce site that sold the bong, “willfully intended to create an association with the Starbucks Marks and to capitalize upon the success and popularity of the Starbucks Marks to sell [their] products.”
The products in question include a line of water pipes (i.e. bongs) that looked very similar to the chain’s Frappuccino cups. The “Dabuccino” glass vessels featured a logo that looked very similar to the company’s Siren and the mouthpiece was a green straw. Pieces from the “line sold from $200 to a whopping $8,000—with their now illegal status, the prices may skyrocket.
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