A US court of appeals confirmed on Friday that the term gruyère is a common label for cheese and can’t be reserved for a type from a specific region, namely in Switzerland or France, on the US market.
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A consortium of Swiss and French cheesemakers from the region around the town of Gruyères in western Switzerland had tried to register the term gruyère in the US as a certified brand. But after being denied an application for trademark protection, they filed a complaint in the state of Virginia, losing in the first instance in early 2022.
On Friday, the Virginia-based US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit upheld the decision, arguing that the US doesn’t have the same protections as in Europe on the name of food products.
“Cheese – regardless of its location of production – has been labeled and sold as gruyere in America for decades,” the courtExternal link said. This concerns cheese produced in Wisconsin or as far away as the Netherlands, Germany or Austria, they added.
The decision was welcomed by several players in the US dairy sector, including the Federation of American Dairy Producers, who said that they hope the ruling will encourage the French and Swiss professional federations to “stop trying to expropriate a common name from food” by registering a trademark.
The Swiss and French federations were, however, “disappointed”, according to their lawyer. “We think the actual situation in the US market is different than as stated by the Court of Appeals, and we will continue to pursue vigorously our efforts to protect the certification mark for the high-quality Gruyere AOP (P.D.O protected designation of origin) product in the US,” said attorney Richard Lehv in a message sent to Agence France-Presse.
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A court in the US has ruled that cheese does not have to come from the Gruyère region of Switzerland to be sold under this name.
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