Fiskars ordered to pay $1.4 million to Woodland Tools
In a lawsuit between two competing garden tool manufacturers, Woodland Tools Co. of Madison, Wisc., and Finland-based Fiskars, the Federal District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin has found Fiskars liable for false advertising.
As a result, the court ordered Fiskars to pay over $1.4 million to Woodland Tools and to adjust the packaging of 14 of its popular gardening products, including removing cutting power claims and amending statements regarding design origins. As the ruling explains: "The misleading cutting power claims were those that made quantified comparative cutting power claims, such as “up to 3x more power” or “cuts 3x easier,” without disclosing the base of comparison." The judge also ruled that Fiskars "must not state on the product packaging of Fiskars 9117 Pruners and Fiskars 9688 Pruners or in any advertising that these products were 'Designed by Fiskars in USA.' " The ruling also applies to the following products, which are sold at a variety of national retailers like The Home Depot, Walmart, Target, Lowe's, and Amazon:
- Fiskars 9154 Loppers
- Fiskars 9480 Loppers (Titanium)
- Fiskars 9480 Loppers (Ultra Blade)
- Fiskars 9279 Hand Pruners
- Fiskars 7972 Loppers (Black)
- Fiskars 7972 Loppers (Titanium)
- Fiskars 9286 Hedge Shears
- Fiskars 9138 Bypass Loppers
- Fiskars 9110 Hand Pruners
- Fiskars 9181 Hedge Shears
- Fiskars 9398 Tree Pruners
- Fiskars 9473 Tree Pruners
Fiskars, which is celebrating its 375th anniversary this year, maintains that Woodland entered the market through unfair means. Namely through copying the design of its products thanks to insider information provided by former employees. As Fiskars wrote in a previous complaint:
"Formed by a former Fiskars employee, Woodland Tools actively recruited Fiskars employees in order to acquire the knowledge and information they possessed related to Fiskars’ business practices, confidential information and trade secrets. Woodland Tools used this information to gain an unfair competitive advantage, improperly exploiting Fiskars’ success. In addition, Woodland Tools deliberately copied Fiskars’ product designs and marketing strategy despite representing to consumers that it was responsible for its designs.”
(Efforts to reach Fiskars for comment on the case were unsuccessful.)
Despite the strikingly similar appearance between Woodland's tools and that of Fiskars, a judge has repeatedly found Woodland to be guilty of no wrongdoing. In a statement to HBSDealer, esteemed Harvard University professor and legal scholar Rebecca Tushnet explained the reality of companies pursuing a "copycat" product strategy:
“In general, without a valid design patent or other intellectual property right, it's completely legitimate to copy other products in order to compete with the original seller. Competition is generally a good thing in U.S. law, because it encourages lower prices and better products. Trademark and valid design patents, as well as utility patents, remain available.”
Moving forward
All claims filed by Fiskars against Woodland Tools were dismissed, and Woodland Tools' upheld counterclaims were taken to trial. As a result of the trial, the jury came to a unanimous verdict, finding Fiskars had engaged in multiple counts of willful false advertising.
In addition to the products found to be "willfully falsely advertised" by Fiskars, the court also ordered Fiskars not to produce packaging for any of the Fiskars garden cutting products sold in the U.S. that make any "Ambiguous Quantified Comparative Cutting Power Claim."
"As an emerging brand in the market, we are grateful that measures are being taken to protect consumers from deceptive advertising, in this case, perpetuated by one of the oldest companies in the world, Fiskars," said Mike Kollman, president and co-founder of Woodland Tools.
