Chief Rules In The Netherlands

The Amsterdam District Court has decided that H&M infringed the trade mark rights of Jeans Centre by selling sweaters on which the sign CHIEF was displayed in large capitals (see above). The H&M sweaters also had an image of a native American and the number "17" below the word CHIEF.

Jeans Centre based its claims on Article 2.20 paragraph 1(a) of the Benelux Convention on Intellectual Property ('BCIP'), which is the equivalent of Article 9 paragraph 2 (a) of the EU Trade Mark Regulation. According to Jeans Centre, the CHIEF sign used by H&M is identical to the word trade mark CHIEF since it reproduces, without any modification or addition, all the elements constituting the trade mark or where, viewed as a whole, it contains differences so insignificant that they may go unnoticed by an average consumer.