THE DISTINCTIVENESS OF A FASHION MONOPOLY HAOCHEN SUN * By focusing on the recent fashion warfare over the red sole used on luxury shoes, this Article reconsiders the implications of trademark protection of single color marks for regulating the development of the fashion industry and the cultural evolution of human society. Courts and commentators have focused on the role of the aesthetic functionality doctrine in deciding whether Christian Louboutin’s red sole mark should be protected by trademark law. This Article takes a different approach. It calls for a social justice–based re-examination of whether the red sole mark is distinctive enough to warrant trademark protection. Based on a close look at the distinctiveness of the red sole mark, the Article puts forward a social justice mandate that should be incorporated into trademark law. It contends that social justice should have the trumping power to deny trademark protection of marks even if they are adequately distinctive. It also shows how the new mandate resonates with the equality-oriented protection under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The Article further addresses practical concerns for implementing the mandate and discusses its merit in solving the problems caused by the aesthetic functionality doctrine.
INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................143 I. THE DISTINCTIVENESS DOCTRINE AND THE LOUBOUTIN LITIGATION ...........150 A. The Roadmap of the Distinctiveness Doctrine .......................................150 1. Inherent Distinctiveness ....................................................................151 2. Acquired Distinctiveness ...................................................................152 3. The Significance of the Distinctiveness Doctrine .............................154 B. The Distinctiveness of the Louboutin Red Sole Mark ............................155 1. Decision of the District Court ...........................................................156 2. Decision of the Second Circuit ..........................................................157 II. RE-EXAMINING THE DISTINCTIVENESS OF THE RED SOLE MARK ..................159 A. The Tough Roadmap of the Secondary Meaning Doctrine ....................160 1. The Scope of the Consuming Public..................................................161 i. Who is “the purchasing public”? ............................................161 ii. A substantial number of the relevant purchasing public ........162 2. Evidentiary Requirements for Proving Secondary Meaning ............163 B. Questioning the Distinctiveness of the Red Sole ....................................166 *
Assistant Professor of Law and Deputy Director of the Law & Technology Center, University of Hong Kong. I am grateful to Irene Caboli, Susan Scafidi, Madhavi Sunder, and Peter Yu for the helpful conversations.
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