Nottinghamshire-based salon owner, Rebecca Dowdeswell, says she has been “left in limbo” due to repeated delays in her trade mark opposition proceedings with French cosmetics giant L’Oreal. The dispute has been ongoing since 2022, when Ms Dowdeswell applied to register a trade mark for her business name “nkd” with the Intellectual Property Office (“IPO”). L’Oreal opposed the application based on its own “NAKED” mark, which it uses on a range of beauty products.
L’Oreal allege Ms Dowdeswell’s use of “nkd” would cause confusion amongst consumers, with the opposition proceedings now awaiting a final hearing before the IPO. Ms Dowdeswell had been informed that a hearing would take place this month but has since been advised the hearing has been pushed back until later this year, much to her dismay.
Ms Dowdeswell claims to have already spent more than £30,000 fighting L’Oreal’s opposition, contending that respective brands are “not even a little similar”. The IPO is attributing the significant delays, in part, to Brexit, which resulted in the addition of around 1.4 million trade marks to the IPO register overnight. The parties are reportedly seeking to resolve the matter, whether they will be able to do so remains to be seen.
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