White Hen Replacement in Ball Square

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

There's a sign on the window announcing that "Tufts Convenience" will be coming into that space soon. The store itself is not ready, evidenced by the huge puddle of water on the floor. Not sure how the university would react to the name, but I guess it's no worse than "Eat at Jumbo's".

Comments

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

There is some precedence to this (see http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HJE/is_1_2/ai_79961249/ & http://tech.mit.edu/V129/N30/harvardtm.html). Harvard has been very aggressive in protecting their name (they sued a website called notharvard.com). The bookstore name predates the time when anyone cared about trademarks much, so I think that the time to stop them from using the Harvard name has long passed.

Colleges have become much more aggressive about protecting their names & mascots, especially because there is so much money to be made on them by licensing (I saw where some big athletic programs are suing over the use of their colors). Of course, Tufts isn't in the world of big money licensing, but they may want to limit any use of the name that they don't control and they do have a trademark licensing policy.

IANAL and certainly not a trademark lawyer, but the name "Tufts" seems to be a distant connection to the other Tufts (except maybe Nathan Tufts Park down the street) and meant to make a connection to the university. It may not bother Tufts at all or there may be legal principles that protect the store. I just don't think I would use the name if I didn't have a good reason to, because sometimes you just end up in a fight.