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Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

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Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#31

Post by makomk »

iso1631 wrote: post #18
avhon1 wrote: post #8

A convenient link to the video in question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6T_BJjitGQ

A quick scan of the complaint indicated they might have a case -- trademarks are important to protect the consumer. However watching the infringing video, he goes to great length to make it clear how it's in the style of Grana Pedano, it's not actually Grana Pedano. His "Feta" video on his channel's home page is more supicious in my layman opinion.

As I understand it, EU Protected Designation of Origin rules are really broad and ban you from even describing a cheese as being in the style of Grana Padano or Parmesan, at least when selling it commercially. They're not just about protecting the consumer but a kind of protectionism. So ever since the protection was extended to the word Parmesan (for a while only Parmigiano-Reggiano was protected) supermarkets here in the UK have all kinds of weirdly generically-named cheeses that are basically cheaper imitations of Parmesan, but they can't describe them as such. There is no longer any generic name for this style of cheese in the English language they're allowed to use.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#32

Post by hrktb »

zozbot234 wrote: post #27

I'm not sure why this is controversial. Trademark owners must defend their trademarks to show that they're in active use, otherwise the trademark might be lost. You're not prevented from making a cheese that's in a similar style, you just can't refer to it in a way that's confusingly simillar to a trademarked name.

BTW trademark owners don't need to defend tooth and nail their trademark

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/11/trademark-law-does-not...

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#33

Post by krageon »

makomk wrote: post #31
iso1631 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick scan of the complaint indicated they might have a case -- trademarks are important to protect the consumer. However watching the infringing video, he goes to great length to make it clear how it's in the style of Grana Pedano, it's not actually Grana Pedano. His "Feta" video on his channel's home page is more supicious in my layman opinion.

As I understand it, EU Protected Designation of Origin rules are really broad and ban you from even describing a cheese as being in the style of Grana Padano or Parmesan, at least when selling it commercially. They're not just about protecting the consumer but a kind of protectionism. So ever since the protection was extended to the word Parmesan (for a while only Parmigiano-Reggiano was protected) supermarkets here…

It is about protecting the consumer, because it prevents a million "grana padano alike cheese product " type products, like you'd get in markets where these rules don't exist.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#34

Post by codetrotter »

veselin wrote: post #22
rstarast wrote: post #14

The C&D seems baseless, considering the video goes out of its way to remark that it's not making "the real thing". I could still see this working out well in terms of publicity for the Grana Padano brand -- seems unlikely there's any real risk of a Streisand effect here where everyone makes their own Grana Padano at home following the video's viral spread.

This request is not baseless at all. If you have in the supermarket a noname cheese that is branded "Grana Padano style", it would hurt the trademark.

Reminds me of a case here in Norway a few years ago back in 2016 where Synnøve Finden, one of the biggest dairy companies in the country, produced a new cheese and marketed it as a “Jarlsberg type cheese”. The dairy company that makes Jarlsberg did not look happily at this and was able to get a ruling that Synnøve Finden was not allowed to do this.

https://www.dairyreporter.com/Article/2016/12/16/TINE-and-Sy...

What the article I linked here does not mention however is that Synnøve Finden complied in a bit of a joking matter where for all of the cheese that had already been packaged with such labeling they printed out black stickers that said “CENSORED” over where the wording with Jarlsberg was. In doing so they managed to get an extra bit of publicity.

I only ever bought Kongsgård once and prefer the original Jarlsberg, but I know that some people liked Kongsgård.

Seems that in a blind test more people liked the original Jarlsberg better too.

https://www.tv2.no/a/8119934/ (article in Norwegian).

And it looks like the Kongsgård cheese is no longer being sold since 2018.

https://dagligvarehandelen.no/2018/kongsgard-ost-ut-av-hylle... (paywalled, Norwegian)

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#35

Post by Reelin »

krageon wrote: post #33
makomk wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand it, EU Protected Designation of Origin rules are really broad and ban you from even describing a cheese as being in the style of Grana Padano or Parmesan, at least when selling it commercially. They're not just about protecting the consumer but a kind of protectionism. So ever since the protection was extended to the word Parmesan (for a while only Parmigiano-Reggiano was protected) supermarkets here…

It is about protecting the consumer, because it prevents a million "grana padano alike cheese product " type products, like you'd get in markets where these rules don't exist.

> It is about protecting the consumer

Nonsense. Protected origin status is protectionism plain and simple. That's not to say whether it's bad or good, just to call it what it is.

Proliferation of confusing low quality lookalikes is prevented by having an enforced criteria and associated labeling requirements. (If the text is too small as in your example then either the labeling requirements aren't sufficient or they aren't being enforced.)

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#36

Post by makomk »

qalmakka wrote: post #29
sam_lowry_ wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The funny part is that Grana Padano were infringing on Parmigiano-Reggiano for centuries.

Lol, that's kind of true. They've been producing basically a _slightly_ inferior, cheaper knock-off version of Parmigiano-Reggiano for centuries and nobody ever complained; at least they always steered clear from associating themselves with the "Parmesan" brand because like many knock-offs they basically achieve what is arguably a less prestigious and blander product by having laxer quality standards. For instance, P…

From what I can tell, they're probably one of the big beneficiaries of the EU removing the last generic term for this kind of cheese by extending protection to the word Parmesan - a lot of UK supermarkets and the like switched to pushing Grana Padano instead.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#37

Post by elmo2you »

globular-toast wrote: post #30
zozbot234 wrote: post #27

I'm not sure why this is controversial. Trademark owners must defend their trademarks to show that they're in active use, otherwise the trademark might be lost. You're not prevented from making a cheese that's in a similar style, you just can't refer to it in a way that's confusingly simillar to a trademarked name.

It's not a trademark, it's a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO). Similar but not the same and I'm not aware of an area being required to exercise their PDO to keep it.

Also, it was always my understanding that a PDO only/just forbids selling a good under a protected name/title, from another origin.

I never expected that to include/extend to the production process, let alone for personal use. I thought these regulations were all about commercial trade, to protect local producers against (supposedly unfair) outside competition. I don't really see how demonstrating a production process harms that.

In fact, considering the PDO protection local producers enjoy, it might just as well be argued that there is no need for any ban on the production of the same goods elsewhere, since those can already not be sold because of the PDO.

Did I just misunderstood the PDO doctrine, or is this just overreach (if not abuse) of it?

A case of wanted to have their cheese and it it too?

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#38

Post by topbanana »

zozbot234 wrote: post #27

I'm not sure why this is controversial. Trademark owners must defend their trademarks to show that they're in active use, otherwise the trademark might be lost. You're not prevented from making a cheese that's in a similar style, you just can't refer to it in a way that's confusingly simillar to a trademarked name.

He states in his original video that it's just cheese in the same style and definitely isn't Grana Padano PDO

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#39

Post by Keyframe »

globular-toast wrote: post #30
zozbot234 wrote: post #27

I'm not sure why this is controversial. Trademark owners must defend their trademarks to show that they're in active use, otherwise the trademark might be lost. You're not prevented from making a cheese that's in a similar style, you just can't refer to it in a way that's confusingly simillar to a trademarked name.

It's not a trademark, it's a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO). Similar but not the same and I'm not aware of an area being required to exercise their PDO to keep it.

Exactly. Quick search on youtube also reveals how to create moonshine cognac, homemade champagne...

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#40

Post by bzb6 »

ajb wrote: post #26

It says his video shows his to make counterfeit Grana Padano cheese. But if I understand correctly, if someone from the correct region followed body instructions, the cheese they made would actually be a perfectly legitimate Grana Padano....

You can only call it that if you make it there and have a licence.
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