Beiersdorf AG, which owns Nivea, had told the Court that HUL’s sales representatives had been drawing unfair comparisons between Ponds cream and Nivea products during a marketing campaign conducted for “Ponds Superlight Gel” in different malls in Delhi and Gurgaon.
Nivea said that HUL’s sales team had been asking mall-goers to apply the Ponds product on one hand, and a cream from an un-labelled blue tub on the other hand.
Notably, the plaintiff claimed that the blue tub resembled Nivea containers, particularly since it was a “Pantone blue colour.”
The Court was further told that HUL’s sales team would then use a magnifying glass to convince the customers that the product from the blue tub left an oily residue on their skin when compared to the Ponds Super Light Gel.
Nivea argued that this was an impermissible, misleading and unfair comparison since:
a) The unmarked blue tub was a reference to Nivea products as the same shade of blue is usually associated with Nivea. Although Nivea does not hold any intellectual property right over the said colour in India, its rights over the said colour were recognised by the German Patent and Trademark Office;
b) The comparison made by HUL was between a “heavy cream” category of Nivea products with a lighter cream/ gel-based Ponds product. The comparison would have been more fair if a light or gel-based Nivea product was compared to the Ponds product in question.
Source: Barandbench
