Bristol Novelty Limited has agreed to permanently stop selling a number of its costume designs, and to remove them from its website and its catalogue, in response to Smiffys’ claim that they are direct and unlawful copies of Smiffy’s original costume designs. Although Bristol Novelty has denied that its dealings in those products infringes Smiffy’s design rights, it has also delivered all outstanding stock of those products to Smiffy’s for destruction and paid  a substantial sum of money to compensate Smiffy’s for its legal costs incurred in this matter.

The relevant costumes are:-

        


David Wain, Smiffys’ UK Sales Manager, said: “As a market leader, we invest significant amounts of time, effort and money into our product design to produce great quality products at competitive prices. We do this because innovation and creativity is what our customers need and expect from us and also because it gives us competitive advantage. We take any copying of our designs extremely seriously. Smiffy's will not tolerate any copying of its original costume designs. Those designs are protected by design rights, which are owned by Smiffy's. All instances of copying which we become aware of will be forwarded to our solicitors, with clear instructions to take legal action to protect and enforce Smiffys’ rights where necessary. We clearly have the backing of the law in this matter and anyone considering challenging Smiffy's on this issue can expect a serious and expensive battle.”