Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, November 10, 1993 TAG: 9311100198
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The Roanoke restaurant, known for its buxom waitresses in revealing T-shirts and shorts, must change its name under a court order issued Tuesday in a trademark-infringement case.
Federal Judge James Turk granted a preliminary injunction sought by Hooters Inc., a national restaurant chain that had accused the Roanoke Hooters of using its trademark illegally.
Turk ruled that a local restaurant of such similar name and reputation is "likely to cause confusion or mistake" with the national Hooters chain.
The injunction orders Hooters of Virginia Inc. to "deliver up for destruction all of their documents, signs, packages, forms, advertisements, business cards, letterheads, apparel (including uniforms and T-shirts) . . . and any other printed material bearing the notation `Hooters.' "
Hooters of Virginia Inc. has 10 days to rid itself completely of "Hooters," including the hot-pink sign in front of its Franklin Road location.
The restaurant will be temporarily nameless - but nonetheless open, according to Frank Perkinson, a Roanoke lawyer who represented restaurant owner Billy Harbour.
"My client's going to stay in business," Perkinson said after a brief hearing in U.S. District Court in Roanoke. "We may have a contest" to come up with a new name, he said.
But for the lawyers of Hooters Inc., their job is only half done.
Tuesday's preliminary injunction will remain in effect until a later trial date, at which point Hooters Inc. may seek damages, attorney Michael Urbanski said.
If the national chain can show it was harmed by association with the Roanoke impostor - which it claims in court papers is less "wholesome and healthy" than Hooters Inc. - it could recover three times the profits Harbour collected through his use of the name.
"I have no idea what their finances are," Hooters Inc. attorney Larry Nodine said when asked if that might put the Roanoke Hooters out of business.
A lawsuit filed last week by Hooters Inc. also noted that Harbour has been convicted of bankruptcy fraud. "Given Mr. Harbour's local reputation," the lawsuit stated, Hooters Inc. is entitled to avoid the public impression that it is in business with "a businessman previously convicted of a scheme to defraud creditors."
Perkinson had argued that the "of Virginia Inc." in the restaurant's name was enough to distinguish it from the national chain. He also pointed to other differences, including the Roanoke restaurant's pink-and-white color scheme.
by CNB