“The Cadillac of such-and-such” became such a popular form of praise in the late ’40s and ’50s that even advertisers of relatively small-ticket items borrowed the brand name to bask in its reflected glory. Hillquist sold “the Cadillac of all trim saws,” a Huffy children’s bicycle was “the Cadillac of the sand-pile set,” Rock-Ola was “the Cadillac of phonographs” and so on. G.M. didn’t object to this appropriation, since it only further boosted the status of the Cadillac brand. After all, according to a 1959 advertisement, Cadillac was “the world’s best synonym for quality.”Cadillac might have known more about "dilution" than today's trademark lawyers.
Sunday, November 08, 2009
The Cadillac of metonyms
The NYT on the continued use of "the Cadillac of X"--what the Language Log calls a snowclone--even as the value of the actual car brand has decreased. Among the interesting bits:
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2 comments:
I disagree with dilution as much as it sounds like you do, but I don't think this would make for a successful dilution claim. Wouldn't "The "Cadillac of X" be a descriptive fair use?
Under current doctrine, it'd be a hard sell. That use doesn't solely describe the defendant's product/service; it also describes Cadillac's, and uses Cadillac in its trademark sense rather than its descriptive sense. Today, we'd more likely call that nominative fair use, but the problem there is that you really don't need to use the mark to talk about your own product/service.
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