Author: Brian Darville, Oblon, McClelland, Maier & Neustadt,
LLP
Verifier: Doug Wolf, Wolf Greenfield
In a dispute between two competing cosmetics companies, a
federal court in Florida recently held that an allegedly fraudulent
Amazon takedown notice, falsely claiming that genuine products were
infringing and counterfeit, was an adequate basis for a false
advertising claim under the Lanham Act. Verbena Prods. LLC
v. BeSweet Creations, Inc., 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27936 (S.D.
FL Feb. 16, 2022).
The plaintiff, Verbena Products, LLC dba Beautyvice, sued the
defendant, BeSweet Creations, Inc. dba Sugarbearhair (Sugar Bear)
and Nicole Johnson, Sugar Bear's owner, CEO, president,
director, and assistant secretary, because Sugar Bear sent a report
signed by Ms. Johnson to Amazon falsely claiming that two of
Beautyvice's Amazon Marketplace listings for Sugar Bear-branded
products were counterfeit products. Sugar Bear's report stated
that the disputed listings are "unsafe
