I’m facing the reality that the last year of my business life has not been, well, fabulous. I’ve dealt with the reality that my beloved business partner now works for someone else, and the days of giggling and plotting and scheming and making money together are over. I’ve also dealt with the humungo (yes, I know it’s not a word) impact that CPSIA is having and will have going forward. I’ve dealt with the reality of our shite economy, but just barely. I’m certainly not sitting on a pile of cash, cackling maniacally over my world domination of the onesie snapsuit world.
I was having one of those great days, today, though. I’ve been managing to pay cash for all of the nap mat inventory as I ramp up toward the infamous nap mat season. I’ve been able to pay down our debt, even though I haven’t been able to pay me. And all in all, things can only get better. Or so I thought.
About two years ago, we received a standard cease and desist letter from an agency on behalf of baby behemoth Gerber(tm). It wasn’t even from a lawyer. Neither Jennifer or I was too upset about it - we knew it was coming based on things we’d heard through the baby apparel grapevine. Did you know that Gerber(tm) invented the onesie(tm)? Yep, they did. Some of our manufacturers are in the know and call them snappy terms like “snapsuit” or my personal unfavorite, “creeper”. If you use the word onesie (TM!!! TM!!!) you must be sure that you are talking about a design on a genuine (TM) Gerber (TM) onesie (TMx140). Unfortunately, when we started the company, we thought like marketers and not lawyers. In other words, people searching online don’t usually search for “funny creepers” or “infant snapsuits”. So, we named our company SassyOnesies.com.
During the first round of worrying about the cease and desist letter, Jennifer called up an IP attorney she’d worked with at a local law firm. He saw the letter and told us to remove the word “onesie (TM!!! this is getting old!)” from our site as a description. We did. We have over 500 products on there - it took QUITE a while. His other advice, since all we were really worried about was them making us change the domain name, was to start stocking Gerber (TM) onesies (TM). We did. The theory being, if we actually carry GerberOnesiesTMTMTMTMTM we can theoretically call our site SassyOnesies.com. Or so he thought.
Fast forward to today, and my cease and desist letter from Gerber. (You can read it here: Letter.pdf)
Now they are specifically stating we must change our domain name. Good times! The virtual cherry on my shit sundae!
I wrote back, but it won’t do anything. I’m married to a lawyer; they laugh at emotion or pleading.
My game plan is to call in a couple of favors to attorneys. I know I have a leg to stand on - you can make a case for terms that have become common vernacular language. Most people don’t even know that there are other words for onesies (TM!) until you point it out to them. And after years and years of owning the word, can we just all get along? Can we share nicely? Menacing Pickle (possibly the best name EVER) suggested that I’m possibly adding value to the onesie (TM) name by having high quality versions. I’m not afraid to say that the majority of the SNAPSUITS we sell are thicker and softer than you-know-whos. In that case, we’re giving them a GOOD name. Fidget suggested one better - we change our logo, and name, to “Sass Yonesies”. I’m pretty sure they would see through that one, but man did it make me giggle thinking about people trying to pronounce it! My Michigan friend Christina suggested kicking Gerber’s butt. My Minnesota friend Kristin suggested boycotting them, and snapsuit (no TM) manufacturer Mary Carter of Gifts of Wit suggested starting a “I hate Gerber” Facebook group. She volunteered to be my first member. I’m so glad I have all of their support because if nothing else, they made me laugh.
If I cannot fight this, then the future is fairly clear. I cannot afford to start up again under a new name and lose all of the search engine work we’ve done to this point. It’s cost us literally thousands (some of which we have yet to pay back) to get to the point we’re at. I have a room full of inventory. If we are forced to change domain names, SassyOnesies.com (TM!) will be closed. I’ll be on the street, naked with a raincoat, whispering in a sultry voice, “Hey, WANNA BUY A CREEPER?” Don’t laugh. It could happen.
In the meantime, I am shaking my fist at the sky, at karma, at everything, and saying, “What the heck did I DO TO YOU??? COME ON!!!!”
** Update: Menacing Pickle, being a huge dork, found out that these phrases used to be TMd: yo-yo, mimeograph, crockpot, kerosene, heroin, linoleum, trampoline, dry ice, pilates, cellophane nylon, thermos, escalator and aspirin.
