A Greedy German Company Was Able to Trademark ‘Blegh’
File this one under “man, late-stage capitalism sure is gross.” Recently, it was revealed that a German company that sells low-rent merch managed to trademark ‘blegh’ — you know, that gutteral sound deathcore dudes make usually before shit pops off. Which, let’s be real, just proves you can try to make money off of literally fucking anything.
The news came out after said company filed a claim against an Etsy clothing store named Death Sentence for using the term on their items. The store in question got flagged because of that claim and if you know what that means, that’s no bueno for the small business.
“Someone in Germany has just trademarked the word BLEGH as their own and as a consequence I can no longer use it. I can prove I was using it before they claimed it as their own, as can dozens of other people/brands/bands out there. What are your thoughts?!”
Oh, I can imagine their thoughts, because Blegh.de did the most predicable thing and turned off their entire comment section on Instagram.
Apparently, the trademark was filed on November 18 of last year, meaning the chance to object to said trademark passed back on September 30 of this year. Apparently the trademark falls under the following categories:
- Class(es) 16: Stickers [decals]; stickers for car bumpers; stickers [stationery]; decorative stickers for car wheel hubs; decals; art prints; tear-off calendars; pop-up greeting cards; canvas prints; engravings
- Class(es) 21: cups; breadboards; mugs; glasses cloths
- Class(es) 25: printed T-shirts; baby tops; baby bibs [not of paper]; baby linen; baseball caps; bobble hats; hats; clothing
If you see the merch being sold online or anything like that, don’t buy it. That’s a gross business practice and we gotta vote with our wallet. It just looks low-rent and garbage anyway.
