Dick Smith says OzEmite name to remain despite IP Australia decision
Dick Smith has says he will continue to use the OzEmite name despite a decision by IP Australia to strike the trademark off the register last week following a battle with Roger Ramsey’s Aussemite .
Smith told Mumbrella the charity foundation had not made a decision on rebranding the product following the decision and would continue to sell the product under the disputed name.
“I’ll do whatever gives us maximum publicity,” he said. “We haven’t taken any advice on it yet. We probably won’t appeal the decision but if Roger Ramsey spends thousands of dollars on fighting us on the name we’ll just change it to Dickymite, that’s quite a good name.
“Anything that creates publicity is good for both of us,” he said, adding he “loves every bit of it” as it can translate into more sales of the product which is part of the Dick Smith Foods stable which donates all profits to charity.
“We’re going to give $1.3 million to charity this year,” Smith said.
He added he wasn’t surprised by IP Australia’s decision explaining he had not spent any money on defending the trademark in court. At the time of the courtcase he told Mumbrella: “We’re not even going to the case today, I’m not going to spend one cent on lawyers. If they settle on striking it out, we’ll just come up with a new name. If we pay money to lawyers and solicitors it’s less going to charity.”
“I can’t believe the amount of money Ramsey spends,” he said of the battle.
Aussiemite had failed to reply to Mumbrella’ requests for comment at the time of publication.
Miranda Ward
Miranda Ward worked for Mumbrella from 2013 to 2017, eventually becoming deputy editor. Miranda joined Mumbrella in September 2013 from Sky News.
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Please forward to mr dick smith please……ozemite…..cozemite – of course! Coz = course. E. = it’s , so in saying that we still know it is still mite of course cheers Julie then only a “c” needs adding to stencil thingy !!
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Anyway, if the proprietor of AussieMite has been able to complain about OzEmite to ASIC (or whichever federal body has been involved if not ASIC) then I wonder why the proprietor of a business in Victoria called Peninsula Hearing hasn’t complained about the proprietor of a shop on the central coast of NSW who, I’ve been told by a former prospective customer of that shop, seems to think that any complaint about the hijacking of that business name has been avoided by simply inserting a second “n” to create the offputting name “Penninsula Hearing”.
If that daft trick is legal then the law should be changed.
The motto of the NSW shop should be “We do hearing, not spelling”.
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Instead of Dick wasting his time and money obsessed with the limited parochial Australian market he should think global and develop a name, strategyand campaign which will be powerful for the global market. I have that name, strategy and campaign ready to go.
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Regardless of the name change (I’ve not tried AussieMite but have had OzEmite) – maybe they should take a leaf out of Pepsi’s book.
Do the “Mite” challenge…which is better!
I find the OzEmite easy to spread over it’s “Kraft-y” competitor
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“I’ll do whatever gives us maximum publicity,” he said.
Says it all, really.
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Dick,
If you are required to change the name of OZEMITE too DICKYMITE Iam sure that you will still have your faithful following!!!
If you are looking for ideas here is my two pence worth.
“OZE”
VITA-B-MITE
Good luck and keep the spread alive.
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Smartmite
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MiteyDick
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