Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Tuesday Ta Da & Workshop

This was made as a teacher appreciation gift for a local school district teacher.

This set included a headband and two hair clips. They are lower in the picture series.

This teacher also teaches aerobic excerise called ZUMBA. I lightly use this term because my listing that had a tag of zumba gear in it featuring one of these items from this set was removed by one of the my online selling sights.


I tagged it as such because all that saw it said it could be used in a zumba class to help pull the hair back while still looking like a lady. Other products they had purchased could not fulfill their needs as mine could.
Since, I bought the materials and designed the headband, saw other sellers tagging their athletic wear that could be used in aerobic classes as such this.  I figured since their items were not pulled by this online store front then it must be okay.

Needless to say a representative from the legal department of Zumba contacted my online store front's legal department. It was removed for copy right infrigment for the use of the name in the tag.

 They said any use of the name "zumba" is held by this llc company.
Any use in any way without their permission is considered a copy right infrigement.
 As you can see from over 20 pictures that were taken, that in no way is this ever
claimed to be from Zumba or part of Zumba product line.

Since many of handmade sellers look at others listings for ways to improve their descriptions or tagging of items.
I am posting this here to EDUCATE everyone including legal departments that are filing infrigments on handmade custom shops to see that we are not infriging on their copy rights. That the handmade community is not claiming we have or are producing items directly for their product line for any product line.

So, far it is okay to tag your items as for the named sport such as running, aerobics, volleyball, cheerleading, prep squad, spirit line, baseball, softball, basketball, etc
But do not use any corporate referrences in your taggings or descriptions such as nike, reebok, including ZUMBA.

If you are writing a review of the product for the company without payment.
Double check with their legal department before writing that blog review because you may be hit with law suit.

I am now out 20 cents for listings. I have had to double check all my listings to be sure any referrence to this type of specific aerobic excerise is removed from all my listings any where.

This was suppose to something nice for a person.
This was suppose to make a person's life  easier.
The big corporations are making our handmade industry a place of impossibility or frustatibility.
I do not know if that is even a word.


I was told by the store front to contact this llc directly to see how we could work more effectively out. Based on the fact the llc did not contact me directly shows me that this company does not give a rats tail on whither or not how or why they were referred too.
This only shows me they are not willing to work with me even I try to work with them.


 Do you think this custom made shop will get an apology?
PROBABLY NOT!


I hope this helps all handmade sellers

4 comments:

Unknown said...

I read your post. There are many many companies that will do the same thing...even SUE YOU for a mistake like that. Don't cross Disney or Nickelodeon....they own more than you can imagine. You can't use a lot of their names. (you can say things like "cartoon mouse" etc. but never the names of the character)

Plus, you also cannot use any of the college team names or sell anything as a product for them unless you buy a crafting license and are approved. (you can't say it's an OU Sooners anything...unless you have a license)

You also can't use John Deere (but you can say tractor) and SO many more I can't even list...

beautiful swag store said...

Is there a way we can compile a list and post it for others to find to keep from getting this from happening. Its really annoying and upsetting. I don't think anyone knows how much time I invest in making sure my tagging and descriptions are not violating anyones rights

Caprica Accessories said...

How rude of them! Zumba should be so lucky to have handmade artisans such as yourself designing lovely goodies to be used with their product. Bah humbug to them I say!

Unknown said...

There really is no way to compile a list of every copyrighted phrase or company name. I would just suggest that everyone avoid directly referencing anything that could/is a company or it's products in their tags or descriptions. For instance...this headband could be tagged aerobics..but never a specific company, or type of aerobics.