Retail giant Tesco has tried to revive part of its lawsuit against discount chain Lidl, telling the Court of Appeal that its German-owned rival had applied for trade marks for a yellow circle against a blue background in bad faith.

Tesco filed a counterclaim against Lidl in 2021, in response to Lidl’s initial lawsuit which said Tesco was trying ’to ride on (its) coat-tails’ by using a logo of a yellow circle on a blue background to promote its 'Clubcard Prices' discount scheme. Tesco argued that Lidl registered a trade mark of its logo without its name to support the trade mark over its more widely used logo.

The High Court dismissed Tesco’s case on bad faith in June, but the supermarket’s lawyers told the Court of Appeal in Lidl Great Britain Limited and anor v Tesco Stores Limited and anor that the logo without Lidl’s name 'has never been seen by the public'.

Simon Malynicz KC for Tesco, said: 'This is an unused (trade mark) logo which has been applied for the purposes of bolstering the protection in Lidl’s logo.'

For Lidl, Benet Brandreth KC argued that Lidl has used the logo without its name and that his client had a good commercial basis for applying for the trade mark. He said in written arguments that Lidl’s underlying case is that Tesco has 'copied Lidl’s logos … to benefit from the association with Lidl’s reputation for high quality goods sold at a low price'.

Documents provided to Lidl by Tesco in the course of the litigation also show that 'many of their customers believe the Tesco [Clubcard Prices] logo to be the Lidl logo', Brandreth added.

Lord Justice Lewison reserved judgment.

A trial of Lidl’s initial claim and Tesco’s remaining counterclaims is due to be heard at the High Court iearly next year.

 

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