Two Indian restaurants are at the centre of a spicy curry karaoke war after one was banned from calling itself Curryoke Club.
The Curry Karaoke Club, run near the Tall Ship at Stobcross Road, Glasgow, took exception to a rival restaurant in the city's Hope Street operating as the Curryoke Club, claiming it broke trademark rights.
Chan Bains, proprietor of the Curry Karaoke Club, which opened nearly five years ago, had purchased the Curryoke trademark last year and says he plans to phase in use of the name by the end of the year. He is also planning Curryoke Clubs in Glasgow's Merchant City, Edinburgh, Birmingham and Manchester.
His legal advisers says the rival's use of the name had confused customers and contacted Black and White 2, the company which runs the Hope Street restaurant, to advise they were infringing a registered trademark and whether the owners would like to licence the brand.
When they refused, a row ensued which resulted in the Curry Karaoke Club winning a court action to stop the use of the name. On Wednesday, court officers moved in to force the removal of signs from the Hope Street restaurant.
It was further revealed yesterday that Mr Bains has also been in dispute with the Ashoka in Charing Cross, Glasgow, over the use of the Curryoke name.
Now Black and White 2 is considering legal advice over changing its name to Curry Karaoke - bringing it into further conflict with its Stobcross Road rival.
Mr Bains has warned Black and White 2 may face further legal action over "passing off" if they proceeded. He said: "It is my hope that this case will serve as a clear warning that we will use the full force of the law to protect our Curryoke brand.
"This blatant trade mark infringement was damaging our business and, more importantly, tarnishing our reputation. When Black and White 2 refused to deal with us on a reasonable basis we were left with no option but to pursue legal action."
The Curryoke and Curry Karaoke term has been common parlance in publicity material used by Indian restaurants putting on karaoke nights for more than three years but solicitors acting for the Stobcross Road club have warned action would be taken against anyone else infringing the Curryoke trademark.
The Curry Karaoke Club secured an interim interdict preventing Black and White 2 from using the word Curryoke or similar in its advertising and signs at the Court of Session in Edinburgh three weeks ago.
A further court order was obtained a week later to force the removal of any signs containing the word within 48 hours. But after Black and White 2 failed to comply, court officers were brought in to remove them.
Axel Ali, managing director of Black and White 2, admitted a mistake was made in not complying with the court order. He said if the Curry Karaoke renaming caused any problems it could resort to calling itself Black and White Karaoke instead.
"We will let the general public decide on this. Most people know of us as Curry Karaoke anyway. We are getting advice to find out if we can get the logos as Curry Karaoke. We are not here for slanging matches. It is a real shame it has all come to this. Okay, we made a mistake and we have held our hands up. We are here for fair trade so we have a policy of live and let live. There is enough room for everyone to make money."
John Bett of McClure Naismith, legal advisers for the Curry Karaoke Club, said each case of breaching trademarks and the use of the name Curry Karaoke, would be considered on its merits. "Apart from the trademark issue, there is a different legal issue of passing off' if our clients feel that someone is effectively passing themselves off as them," he warned.
Mr Bains says he has already licenced the Curryoke brand to the likes of WKD, the alcopop drink for promotions and JD Wetherspoon, the pub chain.
The two restaurants are among many in Glasgow that have enjoyed a rush of interest in the Japanese export over the past decade.
Billy Joel is rumoured to have sung a number at the Horseshoe Bar during a visit to the city while, recently, Elaine C Smith and Michelle McManus have attracted attention for their handling of a pub microphone.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article