Source: cases/15usc1125/us-529-205-wal-mart-v-samara-brothers.case
Case source: https://www.neochart.com/catalog/cases/us/volume_529/0205_01/index.html
We hold that, in an action for infringement of unregistered trade dress under § 43(a) of the Lanham Act, a product’s design is distinctive, and therefore protective, only upon a showing of secondary meaning.
The judgment of the Second Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
casedsl 1 case /us/529/0205-01 name Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Samara Bros. cite 529 U.S. 205 (2000) court Supreme Court of the United States date 2000-03-22 url catalog/cases/us/volume_529/0205_01/index.html source ir/caselaw/us_529.jsonl sha1=bb19b78edba03a90513d38683bfa32f80b77e98b chars=18371 law 15usc1125 role rule-announced posture Supreme Court review of trade-dress verdict; product-design distinctiveness rule announced, judgment reversed and remanded without resolving acquired secondary meaning. result remanded element protected-mark : not-reached variant product-design/secondary-meaning-required theory Children clothing design, not product packaging fact @408..550 [supports] | Its primary product is a line of spring/summer one-piece seersucker outfits decorated with appliques of hearts, flowers, fruits, and the like. fact @945..1215 [supports] | Wal-Mart sent Judy-Philippine photographs of a number of garments from Samara’s line, on which Judy-Philippine’s garments were to be based; Judy-Philippine duly copied, with only minor modifications, 16 of Samara’s garments, many of which contained copyrighted elements. rule @17416..17623 | We hold that, in an action for infringement of unregistered trade dress under § 43(a) of the Lanham Act, a product’s design is distinctive, and therefore protective, only upon a showing of secondary meaning. held @17624..17750 | The judgment of the Second Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. gloss The facts identify the claimed design and copying, not evidence that source significance was proved. The Court rejects inherent distinctiveness as a route for product design; it does not hold that Samara lacks secondary meaning. IR protective OCR is preserved verbatim. misfit Rule selection, not an instance deciding all routes to protectability. A single not-reached block cannot formally express inherent-distinctiveness unavailable while secondary-meaning sufficiency is reserved.