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Your Item Name is My Trademark: The German Understanding of Use as a Mark in the Context of EU Trademark Law


 The most essential trademark function is the origin function, which should enable a person to distinguish the goods and services of one undertaking from those of another. For undertakings there is a likewise evident need to make their own product range distinguishable and identifiable. For this purpose, item names are quite common and certainly catchier than item numbers, since long and random sequences of numbers tend to be difficult to remember. However, conflicts may arise where the item name corresponds with a trademark. In Germany, the Federal Supreme Court issued in 2019 two decisions on item names, SAM (case No. I ZR 195/17) and Damen Hose MO (case No. I ZR 108/18), where it was clarified that the assumption of trademark use is not self-evident. This article discusses whether and how this recent German case law still fits in with EU trademark law and which conclusions can be drawn for item names on an EU-wide scale.