Roasted trademark

A toaster in the form of a Volkswagen van which produces the Volkswagen logo on your toasted bread. Original and funny.

In general a trademark proprietor will see these sort of products as a compliment, a massive commercial gain will probably not be achieved with selling these products. Nevertheless, although it is funny it is still a form of free riding on the famous trademark Volkswagen.

This reminds us on the case of the ei-Pott, an egg-holder in the form of an iPod. The German court found this a particularly funny  product but ruled that the use of the name ei-Pott consisted of an infringement on the i-Pod of Apple anyway.

Although we do not know the name of the Volkswagen roaster (like the name ei-Pott), this case is interesting as the question would be whether a roasted logo would constitute trademark use. Well, at least a question to discuss during a Friday afternoon drink.