August 2018. The trademark registration for Treets, an old and once highly popular brand sold by confectioner Mars, was removed from the European trademark register in early June due to non-use over a period of many years. The case was brought by the German company Piasten, a competitor of Mars.

Use

Trademark law specifies that a trademark must be used in order to remain valid. Failure to do so for more than five years means there’s a risk that someone might try and get it invalidated.

New registration

Piasten clearly had its eye on the old Treets brand, since it’s now made a new application to register the name. So it’s effectively making off with a successful old trademark, which may strike you as unjust, but those are the rules in trademark law.

Will Treets replace Piastens’ Big Ben? Piasten also registered the Treets logo