Sports/football team names PLEASE HELP

[lemontdetroit84]

After doing a little research and a few searches I was wondering If there was any way you guys could help me. I have done a design for some mugs for some football teams. For example I have a sky blue mug and some football .png's on it (I have rights for this) and on the mug it has "name" Supports Coventry. Is this allowed? There is no team badge or anything like this on it. just the wording in a funky font! I was also wondering is it ok to do similar mugs for other teams like say if it was for man united am I allowed to put "name" suppors united with a red background? and maybe "name" supports city with a man city like colour background? I'm getting pretty confused with this stuff! I would never use the actual club badge for this as I know that is a NO GO area and there are many silly people that do this and will probably be caught at some point. I just want some clarification on my way of doing things. I know you cant use the teams full name or nickname but am I allowed to do what I have explained? Thanks

[Andrew]

What you say largely sounds okay but it's a grey area that you would be in. Keeping the right side of the law is some times open to interpretation. A coloured background and United/City should be vague enough. Coventry is more borderline as a bit more specific.

[lemontdetroit84]

Thanks for your answer. I just wasnt sure because I know you can't trademark the name of a town. Well Im under the impression you cannot anyway. So I thought If I used the name of a town I would be more ok than if I used United or City. Its a scary area for me as I really dont want to get into any trouble. As I have heard people are not looked upon lightly. It just infuriates me when I see people selling mugs with stuff on like bieber, gaga, michael jackson, and things like call of duty and other movies, games and im scared to put just the word coventry, city or united on a mug lol

[Andrew]

Coventry is more and when combined with the colour and a football then passing off is easier to claim. So many teams use United city and red / blue combos that there is little to stop you. Coventry still possibly fine but all depends on how intent a club is to stop people. I have seen many a market trader stand outside a club and sell very borderline merchandise with nicknames of teams and all sorts indictating the team yet get away with it. It's just a case of knowing where you cross the line. You somethimes only find out where the line is when the judge decides in court if you are guilty or not which usually means that if you aren't sure if it is okay or not....... don't do it. Better safe than sorry. This is an area done to death so better off finding a bit of the market you can develop and create a reputation for yourself.

[ADP]

HI Lemon, I had the same sort of question asked to me a while back if i could do a mug with name, united biggest fan in their colors so i emailed man utd to ask the question and see what they said, This is the reply i got

Dear Adam

Thank you for taking the time to contact us with your enquiry.

I would like to take this opportunity to advise you that Manchester United is one of a number of registered trademarks owned by Manchester United Limited.

We have a strict but consistent policy and only allow official licensees, sponsors and partners to use our Trade Marks.

All our licensing rights lie with Manchester United Merchandising Limited, which is a subsidiary company of Nike. If you would like to enquire about becoming an official licencee, please visit their Licensing website atwww.mulicensing.com (http://www.mulicensing.com/) and complete the Licence Proposal Form.

Kind regards

Brand Protection

I only wanted to used utd and the same colors lol

[purpledragon]

You can not use the name Coventry in the context of a footbal mug nor can you use ccfc as ADP has found out the football clubs have this pretty much sewn up and do purse copyright violation with rotwiller like attitude for example manchester utd have copyright on Manchester Utd , MUFC, MAN U and probably any other combination you can think of violate these at your peril .
BTW town and city names are copyright its crown copyright i believe though i dare say someone will correct me if im wrong but im fairly certain you cant just print the name coventry legally how the crown pursues this is another matter

[mrs maggot]

For example I have a sky blue mug and some football .png's on it (I have rights for this)

I'm a bit confused, what images have you got rights for ??? are they just generic football ones, or ones relating to Coventry ?

Football stuff is as others have said is normally a massive no no, there is a guy at the Coventry ground who prints t shirts and stuff isnt there, in a booth outside ? would be worth having a look at what he prints and what he doesnt, afterall if he is actually on a pitch at the football ground, you can bet your bottom dollar he has full permission for printing those items.