Intellectual Property

Ferrari Threatens To Sue Guy For Owning A Ferrari While Acting Like A D-Bag

Intellectual property law tries to save a brand from the image it's cultivated for years.

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Not a Ferrari, but another supercar from a manufacturer who isn’t going around threatening people.

German designer Philipp Plein is the kind of wealthy guy who spends his days posting shirtless bros and bikini models draped over his sportscars. He’s a sentient Axe Bodyspray commercial and exactly why Instagram both exists and must be destroyed. That said, in the annals of the self-promotion of rich douchebags, Plein’s not throwing porn stars off of balconies — which is a whole other cease-and-desist letter — so he’s already cleared that rock bottom bar. In any event, part of Plein’s efforts to show off his lavish lifestyle is the occasional pic of his shoe designs color-coordinating with his Ferrari.

To wit:

via Philipp Plein’s Instagram account — one of the allegedly offending images

This is where the lawyers step in and send Plein a threatening letter demanding that he remove these images visually associating his brands with Ferrari’s trademarks. It’s probably not all that likely that consumers will see this picture and guess that Ferrari is endorsing Plein’s products, but it’s 2019 and aggressively exploiting intellectual property laws for fun and profit is all the rage. Plein excerpted some of the letter from Italian firm Orsingher Ortu:

In these pictures, Ferrari’s trademarks are used again for promotional purposes of your brand and products, unlawfully appropriating the goodwill attached to them. Your behavior, however, is even more harmful and serious in this case.

More harmful? Go on….

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Ferrari’s trademarks and model cars are associated in your pictures with a lifestyle totally inconsistent with Ferrari’s brand perception, in connection with performers making sexual innuendos and using Ferrari’s cars as props in a manner which is per se distasteful.

Since at least the original run of Magnum P.I., the Ferrari has draped itself in exactly this “shirtless bros and bikini models” brand perception. As a Ferrari driver myself… sort of… I’ll personally attest to this. The company may wish that every Ferrari driver is the kind of person willing to sacrifice their car to floodwaters help a client in need. The good folks at Jalopnik put it best, “Ferrari, you deluded fools: this kind of wealth-can’t-buy-taste shit is the reputation of Ferrari’s brands.”

And that gets to the real heart of the letter, though it had to maintain a certain level of pearl-clutching since it had to know Plein would make it public. Emphasis added:

This behavior tarnishes the reputation of Ferrari’s brands and causes Ferrari further material damage. In fact, the undesired connection between Ferrari’s trademarks on the one hand, and Philipp Plein’s line of shoes (and the questionable manner in which they are promoted) on the other hand, is interfering negatively with the rights enjoyed by Ferrari’s selected licensees which are exclusively entitled to use Ferrari’s trademarks to produce and promote line (sic) of shoes Ferrari branded.

Ferrari isn’t troubled that its brand is associated with a Jersey Shore pastiche, but that it’s associated with a Jersey Shore pastiche it’s not getting paid for. There’s no high-minded principle at work here — there’s Ferrari’s drive to pocket a little extra cash they can use to fix the Scuderia’s laughably off pace cars.

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After 48 hours, Plein’s posts were still up. Let’s see what happens.

Ferrari Wants Instagrammer To Remove Pics Of His Car Because It’s Delusional About Who Buys Ferraris [Jalopnik]
Ferrari Allegedly Threatens 812 Superfast Owner With Legal Action Over ‘Distasteful’ Instagram Posts [The Drive]

Earlier: Lawyer Abandons Ferrari to Get to Hearing on Time
That Time They Gave Me This Ferrari At A Tech Show

HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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