Coca-Cola falls flat in EU trademark dispute

Coca-Cola’s latest bid to win EU trademark protection for a new version of its iconic bottle fell flat as judges said its curvaceous design wasn’t distinctive enough.

The world’s biggest soft-drink company sought to convince the EU General Court in Luxembourg consumers would see it as a “natural evolution” of the earlier shape loved by designers and artists from Andy Warhol to Salvador Dali. But the court ruled the shape is “a bottle like the majority of bottles on the market.”

It’s a “mere variant of the shape and packaging” of such products “which will not enable the average consumer to distinguish” this shape from others.