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Nintendo Loses After Trying To Oppose The Trademark For A Costa Rican Grocery Store
from the super-duper dept
While most of our conversations about Nintendo recently have focused on the somewhat bizarre patent lawsuit the company filed against Pocketpair over the hit game Palworld, traditionally our coverage of the company has focused more on the very wide net of IP bullying it engages in. This is a company absolutely notorious for behaving in as protectionist a fashion as possible with anything even remotely related to its IP. That reputation is so well known, in fact, that it serves the company’s bullying purposes. When smaller entities get threat letters or oppositions to applied-for trademarks and the like, some simply back down without a fight.
But not the Super Mario shop in Costa Rica, it seems. The supermarket store owned by a man named Mario (hence the name), has had a trademark on its name since 2013. But when Mario’s son, Charlito, went to renew the registration, Nintendo’s lawyers suddenly came calling.
Last year it was time to renew the registration, Charlito stated, which prompted Nintendo to get involved. While Nintendo has trademarked the use of Super Mario worldwide under numerous categories, including video games, clothing and toys, it appears the company did not specifically state anything about the names of supermarkets.
This, Charlito says, was the key factor in the decision by Costa Rica’s trademark authority, the National Register, to side with the supermarket.
But not the only factor, to be sure. As you will see from the picture below, it is extremely clear, based on the rest of the store’s signage and branding, that there is absolutely no attempt in any of this to draw any kind of association with Nintendo’s iconic character.
Why Nintendo feels the need to do this sort of thing is beyond me. The shop already had the name for over a decade, and had a trademark on the name for over a decade, all apparently without any noticeable effect on Nintendo’s enormous business. For a renewal of that mark to trigger this kind of conflict is absurd.
But not, apparently, without at least some silver lining for the victorious Super Mario shop.
“Well now, we are trending, everyone is talking about us for the resolution by the National Register that gave the decision in our favour for the brand Super Mario – which, by the way, here you can ask the cashiers for a sticker.”
At this point in the video, Charlito holds up a free sticker customers can collect with the shop’s Super Mario logo on.
Well, that’s just super, Mario.
Filed Under: costa rica, super mario, trademark
Companies: nintendo
Comments on “Nintendo Loses After Trying To Oppose The Trademark For A Costa Rican Grocery Store”
It’s a slippery slope from saying Nintendoes aren’t groceries to saying microplastics aren’t groceries. What about Nintendo’s free speech?
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While I feel confident that your tongue is firmly in your cheek, I have to say that your argument makes more sense than some MAGA arguments lately have.
Your confidence is well-placed. I was honestly counting on the presence of proper grammar, spelling, and syntax to convey it, as much as anything. One typo would have knocked me off the razor’s edge.
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And we care?
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Scroll on past, baby girl.
Nintendo is the only gaming company that takes down YouTube videos of people playing their games or reviewing games on Nintendo consoles. Sony and Microsoft know that YouTube videos are free advertising promotion
Eg look at game x on xbox or Sony console
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Nah, plenty of other gaming companies do all of those things. Nintendo is worse than most, but don’t pretend this is some kind of isolated issue.
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Nintendo has a history of opposing any fair use, to include reviews and commentary (on its first party games). This has lead multiple online games reviewers to note they don’t cover nintendo because they will impede your ability to make money off any such review, unless you are their direct partner (and lose your editorial independence). These journalists cite the impacts on the comparative performance of video’s on Nintendo properties over Sony or Microsoft or third party properties to highlight that a meaningful difference exists in the level of use (and abuse) of copyright tools around post-launch coverage of a game.
Sony and Microsoft have been found to abuse the same legal but morally questionable tactics, but Nintendo appears to have a higher volume of incidents. While Sony And microsoft actively patrol leaks, and breaches of street dates or review embargoes, they have been generally willing, as have most major 3rd party publishers, to allow review and commentary without complaining about limited fair use. 3rd parties, like music rights orgs, are most often the culprit, in direct contest to Nintendo being the primary culprit attacking fair use of content. The growth in acceptance reflects marketing departments convincing CEOs that getting millions of impressions, showing people the game and developing name recognition, all without a single dollar of marketing spend, is actually good, and that a ton of legal cases around fair use are losers for reputation and revenue.
Nintendo has been notably behind the curve when it comes to acceptance of fan marketing not tightly controlled by its PR, and it plays out in the financials of creators in the space. Between the big 3, its not even close, Nintendo is significantly more suppressive of attempts at fair use, including both live streaming and bespoke VOD content.
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No, they aren’t. Look at Sony right now, they literally sued someone for making a patch of 60 fps to Blood born. Nintendo may have an out of touch legal department, but they aren’t anymore worse compared to the giants like Disney and Sony.
If trademark law allow suing the infant named "Mario", I bet they will sue.
They just have no respect.
Mario name has just existed before Nintendo created a character named Mario.
Mario name is just taken from Mario Segale.
Zelda name is just taken from Zelda Fitzgerald.
They just sue everything named Mario if they can.
Glad that they lost.
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“absolutely no attempt in any of this to draw any kind of association with Nintendo’s iconic character.”
Other than using the same name.
Hang on a minute! That is absolutely an attempt to draw sone kind of association with Nintendo’s iconic character.
Maybe get someone to proofread your articles before you publish them?
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Calling John Smith! Calling John Smith! Will John Smith please come to the front desk.
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And you think Nintendo wouldn’t have bothered with a lawsuit if the name of the store had instead been Mario’s Supermarket? If you do, I’ve got a bridge to sell you.
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You should get someone to proofread your brain before commenting.
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Yeah, this cannot be true here. Where is clear evidence that proves that he didn’t use the character in his store. Something seems off here.
We all should just fuck with Nintendo and just put “Super Mario” next to all our businesses. I’m calling mine “Super Mario Starbucks”.
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As a plumber named Mario (First and last name) I must do this!
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That is a violation of copyright protection laws. You can’t do that legally. Go ahead and make your life more miserable ig.
If Charlito had the rights to the trademark back in 2013, then how come he had to renew it?
Hi. I am one of my own who is enthusiastic about the Super Mario franchise. I’ve been a fan of Mario ever since I gotten a Wii long back in 2006, or later, I’m not sure really. On behalf of what is going on, I just want to say that Nintendo was wrong to do this, I very much agree, and I want to also note that I am not picking or choosing to be on their side. But the problems that I have with this legal firm is that the guy who runs that store doesn’t really know what he’s gotten himself into.
Nintendo, as a company lately, maybe their legal department, again, don’t have very much knowledge of what they do, have been obnoxiously pursuing legal action against many law breaking activities, some like ROM sites, which technically by U.S. law, people aren’t entitled to owning ROMs they have rights to, or fan games, hit games that rip off to use their assets, like Palworld almost, though, that could be entirely different.
My point though is that Charlito really shouldn’t own this trademark. I am no MAGA person, not affiliated with that group of people, never will be. What will he even use it for? The thing could probably be sat on and never used, or it could expire yet again. I just feel like the whole thing is giving him attention because he only won a lawsuit once. He could probably lose the trademark the next time around, but I wouldn’t know that for sure.
Anyway, that’s just what I thought, really. Not really going to root for someone who is practically a stranger, but what could I do?