Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
among the relevant class of persons'. These provisions applied Arts 3(1)(c) and
3(3) of the Trade Marks Directive concerning the registrability of geographical
words.
In language which has been repeated in its subsequent decisions on geographic
marks, the ECJ explained that Art 3(1)(c) of the Directive 'pursues an aim
which is in the public interest, namely that descriptive signs or indications
relating to the categories of goods or services in respect of which registration is
applied for may be freely used by all, including as collective marks or as part of
complex or graphic marks'.
41
Thus Art 3(1)(c) prevents 'such signs and indica-
tions from being reserved to one undertaking alone because they have been
registered as trade marks'.
42
As regards, more particularly, signs or indications
which may serve to designate the geographical origin of the categories of goods
in relation to which registration of the mark is applied for, especially geographi-
cal names, the Court observed that:
6.34
[I]t is in the public interest that they remain available, not least because they may be an
indication of the quality and other characteristics of the categories of goods concerned,
and may also, in various ways, influence consumer tastes by, for instance, associating the
goods with a place that may give rise to a favourable response.
43
The Court noted that the public interest underlying the provision 'is also
evident in the fact that it is open to the Member States, under Article 15(2) of
the Directive, to provide, by way of derogation from Article 3(1)(c), that signs
or indications which may serve to designate the geographical origin of the
goods may constitute collective marks'.
44
Also in language repeated in its subsequent decisions the ECJ ruled that Art
3(1)(c) is to be interpreted as meaning that:
6.35
+
it does not prohibit the registration of geographical names as trade marks
solely where the names designate places which are, in the mind of the
relevant class of persons, currently associated with the category of goods in
question; it also applies to geographical names which are liable to be used
in future by the undertakings concerned as an indication of the geographi-
cal origin of that category of goods;
+
where there is currently no association in the mind of the relevant class of
persons between the geographical name and the category of goods in
41
[1999] EUECJ C-108/97, at para 25.
42
Ibid.
43
Ibid, at para 26.
44
Ibid, at para 27.
