London-based brewer Fuller’s has threatened to sue Swedish microbrewery Sigtuna Brygghus if it doesn’t drop the acronym ESB from its ESB Extra Sigtuna Bitter.
Fuller’s, whose ESB (Extra Special Bitter) brand is considered the very definition of the style around the world, apparently doesn’t believe that imitation is the best form of flattery and have asked Sigtuna to immediately drop the abbreviation from bottles of their new beer now available to order from the Swedish alcohol monopoly stores.
Reacting to the news Sigtuna Brygghus’s founder Peter Forss said: ”Yes we have received a letter from Fuller’s. Our ambition is to produce great beer and not to fight with the big players. We simply don’t have the resources. They claim that they own the abbreviation ESB and so we’ll respect that and will remove it from our own bottles”.
BeerSweden is currently trying to contact Fuller’s for a comment.
Fuller's didn't take kindly to the use of the abbreviation ESB on labels of Sigtuna's Extra Sigtuna Bitter.
And so it happened, major players stepping on minor players…….sad but true.
That’s why Sierra Nevada used ESB for Early Spring Beer, to avoid theese type of actions.
This has happened before in Sweden with Jämtlands Bryggeri. If I remember correctly, Postiljon also used to mention ”ESB”. They were also asked to drop it. I also seem to remember that if you bought a Postiljon for a good while after, ESB continued to appear on Systembolaget receipts.
Beeing a beer nerd and a lawyer, naturally these things interest me. Although I’m not an expert in the Intellectual Properties field, I’m pretty sure that Fullers wouldn’t be successful in a swedish court. ESB is just a description, not a brand. It’s what you call a ”degenererat varumärke”, such as the classic example Vespa. Fullers claim is as absurd as if the owners of Thomas Hardy’s would sue everyone using the description Barley Wine.
Samma sak hände med Jämtlands Bryggeri (Postiljon ESB blev SPA) och ESB är ett varumärke och INTE en ölsort, så det är bara att respektera detta. Så jag tycker att det är löjligt att påstå att de ”stora” försöker knäcka de ”små”. Ett registredat varumärke är ett varumärke och inget annat. Så funkar det.
///Thomas Bingebo
Bryggare
Oceanbryggeriet
The anom guy is wrong. ESB is a brand-name and would stick in any court in Europe (not the US). Bitter is ok but ESB is not. I told the story to the brewer at Sigtuna a long time ago about Jämtland and still they so the same mistake…call it a Special Pale Ale or Strong Bitter…or nwhen in doubt – fuck it!
Thomas, you are not adressing the judicial question of whether the brand has degenerated or not. Even if the brand is registered, the protection doesn’t apply if it has degenerated into a generic description of products of that kind. The fact that the etiquette ”ESB” is the accurate decription of a certain beer type is pretty obvious to me. See the links below.
http://shbf.se/documents/typdefs/Oltypsdefinitioner.pdf
http://www.ratebeer.com/beerstyles/premium-bitter-esb/101/
Well said Thomas…
Yeah Tomas…You told me a lot of stories over the past years, and there´s not a chance in hell i can remember them all
…
What can i say? I´m a rebel! I didn´t actually think Fullers would be interested…
I´ll be more careful next time
Mattias Hammenlind
Head Brewer, Sigtuna Brygghus
ESB IS registered as a brand by Fullers, just as London Pride is too. If any brewery called a beer London Pride, they would expect a legal missile from Fullers up their brew-kettle! Many brands use letters; XXXB, XPA, HSB, HSD and surely many more, all registered as product brands and all protected just like ESB. Just because we all refer to Indian Pale Ales as IPAs, a generic category, (even though most IPAs are not brewed in the UK for export to British colonies) does not mean that ESB is another catagory.
If anyone insists on creating a catagory for ‘ESBs’ then it must follow the rules and be a party-gyled, stronger version of a previously existing British-type bitter ale. This means that ESB is the ‘ESB’ of London Pride, but not necessarily that Ruddles County is the ‘ESB’ of Ruddles Best. They are two different brews!
Mr Sharpe as I live and breathe! Great to see you here on BeerSweden