Just A Car Guy: WOW! Here's a newsflash! Chrysler is, and has been, sued by SCAT Enterprises for the "Scat Pack" marketing campaign

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

WOW! Here's a newsflash! Chrysler is, and has been, sued by SCAT Enterprises for the "Scat Pack" marketing campaign

Chrysler first launched the Scat Pack campaign with the 1968 Charger, Coronet, Dart, and SuperBee.

That's exactly what Chrysler is doing with its all-new Scat Pack campaign on the modern 5.7-liter HEMI-equipped R/T Challenger and Charger.

Back to the lawsuit though, the California company called Scat Enterprises, (crankshafts you're familiar with http://www.scatenterprises.com/) who have been in business since 1963.

When Chrysler first launched the Scat Pack cars in 1968, Scat Enterprises sent a cease-and-desist letter to the automaker as a means of defending its own name. The early Scat Pack cars went away in 1971.

According to Automotive News, Chrysler reached out to the US Patent and Trademark Office to establish the fact that it was going to revive the Scat Pack name. The attempt was denied by the USPTO but Chrysler went ahead anyway at the 2013 SEMA show.

Scat Enterprises is now suing the automaker (Oct 15th 2014 it was filed). It wants all marketing material delivered to its office so that it can oversee the destruction of said material. Additionally, the aftermarket company is also looking for monetary damages.\

From the filed lawsuit, Line Item 58 "Plaintiff has no plain, speedy or adequate remedy at law and will continue to suffer great and irreparable injury to the trade identify rights for which it cannot be fully compensated in damages - unless the Court enjoins Defendant from further use of its confusingly similar and false designations of origin SCAT PACK and SCAT, and other designations including the term SCAT."

and line item 68 "Defendant’s unauthorized usage of SCAT PACK and SCAT marks, and commercial phrases that include the term “SCAT”, is likely to injure Plaintiff’s business reputation; is likely to dilute the distinctive quality of Plaintiff’s marks; is likely to cause confusion, mistake or deception as to the correct source of Defendant’s goods; and infringes Plaintiff’s trade identity rights and related property rights under the common law and statutory laws of the State of California"

But line item 74 seems most ridiculous "Defendant’s above-described conduct was and is: intended to cause injury to Plaintiff; despicable conduct carried on with willful and conscious disregard of the rights of Plaintiff; and despicable conduct that subjects Plaintiff to cruel and unjust hardship in conscious disregard of Plaintiff’s rights, thereby making Defendant liable for exemplary and/or punitive damages."

Chrysler stands by its use of the Scat Pack name, and views the lawsuit as meritless, and points out that Scat Enterprises, marketing under the term "Scat", has never used the term "Scat Pack".

This is not likely to be a coincidence, 2 weeks before SEMA, and the Mopar booth having a big ol Scat Pack display like last year http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2013/11/shaker-hoods-for-2014-challenger-and.html and http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2013/11/mopar-has-done-slight-but-cool-redesign.html