Adidas and subsidiary Reebok are coming after e-commerce sellers who the brands say are selling fake versions of their sneakers.
In a suit filed Monday, April 9 in Florida federal court, Adidas and Reebok say more than 50 online sellers are infringing on trademarks by “promoting, selling, offering for sale and distributing goods bearing counterfeits and confusingly similar imitations.”
A total of 53 accounts on platforms including Instagram, Ebay, Bonanza and Ioffer are named, which the filing calls “nothing more than illegal operations established and operated in order to infringe the intellectual property rights.” The suit goes onto state that many of the accounts are using paid advertising such as Instagram’s sponsored post to increase business.
The lawsuit says the counterfeit items are “likely to cause confusion, deception, and mistake in the minds of consumers, the public, and the trade before, during, and after the time of purchase” by misleading buyers into thinking they’re purchasing official Adidas or Rebook products.
In addition to requesting that all of the infringing seller IDs be disabled and their respective bank accounts frozen, Adidas is also seeking $2,000,000 from each party for every counterfeit trademark used and product sold—putting the grand total of damages at well over $106,000,00.
