A box from Amazon.com is pictured on the porch of a house in Golden, Colorado July 23, 2008. Sure you have. But while this search behavior is arguably great for customers, it’s the reasoning behind a trademark lawsuit against the online retailer. The ruling says that MTM Special Ops are premium military watches that aren’t available on the Amazon website, and if shoppers search for the item, Amazon does not notify buyers that it doesn’t offer MTM watches on its site.
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Instead, Amazon displays MTM Special Ops in the search field and immediately below the search field, along with similar watches manufactured by MTM’s competitors for sale.
The counter to this argument is that, while Amazon doesn’t specifically say it doesn’t sell MTM’s gear, it’s definitely not saying that any of the products on the list are made by the company.
They also claim that it does not encourage customers to search elsewhere for MTM’s products, which we suppose makes sense given that Amazon would much rather keep customers shopping on their site and making their purchases through them.
Adjudicating on the issue the 9th USA Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled in favour of the plaintiff, noting that other online retailers will display a message when a product is not in stock.
The firm sued, and a Los Angeles federal judge resolved the trademark claims in favor of Amazon before trial. Per the ruling, Amazon had “created a likelihood of confusion” through its inability to tell shoppers that it doesn’t offer MTM watches.
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The case in the 9th Circuit is Multi Time Machine Inc vs. Amazon.com Inc and Amazon Services LLC, 13-55575.
