[A] trademark dispute that brewed up between beer companies in Vermont and Virginia has been settled in favor of the Williston company, Goodwater Brewery.
Goodwater claimed Virginia-based Lickinghole Creek Craft Brewery, or LCCB, infringed on its trademark when it opened a pub called Lickinghole Goodwater Brewpub in Richmond, Virginia. In its lawsuit, filed last December, Goodwater claimed it had sent a cease-and-desist letter to LCCB in November 2017. LCCB never responded, according to the decision, which was handed down Nov. 1 in federal court in Burlington.
The Vermont brewery’s owner, Marty Bonneau, found out about the other Goodwater last year after a customer emailed him to ask him if he knew about it, said Goodwater’s Burlington lawyer, Ian Carleton. Goodwater is a French translation of Bonneau.
“It didn’t take long to find it on the internet,” Carleton said.
In December, Goodwater filed a federal trademark infringement lawsuit against LCCB seeking to stop the Virginia brewery from using the name, as well as monetary damages and attorney’s fees. Goodwater had been using the name since the beginning of 2014, and had applied for the trademark in 2016, according to the initial complaint.
The Vermont Goodwater sells its beers as far west as Colorado and as far south as Virginia, and LCCB sells its beer in Vermont, Carleton said.
“And so there are overlapping markets which is an important thing to demonstrate in trademark cases,” he said.
Soon after the lawsuit was filed, the two sides began talks and the matter was settled amicably, Carleton said.
“The craft brewery world is still relatively small and everybody likes to proceed on as friendly a basis as possible, but obviously trademarks are important for a business and you need to protect them,” he said.
