Walmart Just Started a Legal Battle With Kanye West Over This
The big box stores and the rapper are butting heads in a big way.
Kanye West has been at the center of countless public feuds—with Taylor Swift, Drake, and Jay Z, just to name a few. Now, the rapper is in a showdown with possibly his most well-known adversary to date: Walmart. The United States' biggest retailer has just filed paperwork in an Arkansas court against the rapper and his Yeezy footwear and apparel line. Read on to discover why the big box store is fighting with Kanye, and for more on what your favorite celebrities are really like, A Disney World Employee Is Rating Celebrities Based on How Rude They Are.
Walmart has filed a Notice of Opposition regarding a new Yeezy product logo.
On April 21, Walmart filed a Notice of Opposition in the company's native Bentonville, Arkansas, against California-based Yeezy LLC. In court documents, the big box store stated that a logo design Yeezy had filed trademark registration paperwork for was too similar to the big box store's own logo.
Walmart has famously used a sunburst logo consisting of six tapered dash marks on its products for years; Yeezy's proposed logo is an eight-pointed sunburst with a similarly blank center, although, in contrast to Walmart's logo, the dashes in the Yeezy logo are each comprised of three black dots, rather than a single solid mark. And for the latest celebrity news delivered straight to your inbox, sign up for our daily newsletter!
Walmart says Yeezy's proposed logo may confuse customers.
While Yeezy products have not graced Walmart shelves, nor has Kanye shilled Walmart goods, Walmart claims that the similarities between the Walmart logo and proposed Yeezy logo are sufficient enough to cause damage to the big box store's brand. Above, the proposed Yeezy logo can be seen on the left, while Walmart's existing logo is on the right.
"Because consumers have come to recognize and associate the goods and services of [Walmart] by [Walmart]'s mark, the use of Applicant's Mark by [Yeezy] is likely to cause deception…in that [Yeezy]'s Mark misdescribes the nature or origin of the goods and services offered under [Walmart]'s Mark and will materially alter a consumer's decision to acquire [Yeezy]'s goods and services due to a mistaken thought of connection to [Walmart] and [Walmart]'s Mark," Walmart explained in its court filing. Best Life has reached out to Yeezy for a comment regarding Walmart's Notice of Opposition.
Another upcoming Yeezy collaboration's logo has similarly confused fans.
The Walmart-opposed sunburst logo isn't the only choice of imagery from Yeezy that's been a source of confusion as of late. On April 9, Yeezy filed trademark paperwork for a logo that will represent the brand's upcoming collaboration with Gap. The logo mimic's Gap's own branding—a blue square with rounded edges with white lettering in the brand's signature font reading "Gap"—except in Yeezy's case, the logo reads "YZY."
When Kanye first posted a photo of the logo to his Twitter in June 2020, the rapper's followers were quick to slam its design. "Work in progress logo I hope," wrote one user. "The logo is uneven and triggering… and terribly designed. You couldn't ffiver (sic) this, my dude?" asked another. And for more news about the beloved apparel chain, This Iconic Clothing Company Is About to Close 100 Stores.
This isn't Yeezy's only public legal battle in recent years.
While Walmart may be the biggest name to fight Yeezy in court, it's far from the first time Kanye or his namesake brand have faced legal challenges in recent years. In 2019, Kanye and the Yeezy company were individually sued by Japanese fabric company Toki Sen-I Co., which claimed the rapper and his fashion house had ordered $624,051 worth of fabric, only to skip out on the bill. However, in 2020, the fabric company dropped the suit before the case could head to court, The Blast reports. And for more on Kanye's past, Kenan Thompson Says This "SNL" Guest Made the Cast "Extremely Uncomfortable."
