UGG Gold Lettered Signboard: Who Is My Master?

Leather boots

The value of beer sold over Sam Adams ($415 million 100 thousand), firearms sold by Smith &Wesson ($334 million 900 thousand), baseball sold by New York's New York Yankees ($375 million) and Marie Callender 's sold apple pie ($536 million).

In its native place, Australia, the winter sheepskin boots have been looked down upon until recently. No self respecting person would like to be seen wearing such boots outside his home, because it was first fashionable among the sheared workers who avoided frostbite of toes in the shearshed.

But whether scornful or admired, you can hardly find anyone anywhere that you have never heard of or haven't worn. This kind of PT PT Cruiser, a Chrysler model, has a classic retro look.

Although people accept it differently,

In 1995, DEX, which has several new clothing and footwear brands (including Teva) in California, acquired UGG for about $14 million 600 thousand.

Three years later, the UGG president, Constance Rishwain Constance (Rishwain), who was nicknamed "Connie", passionately called it the "opening year" period, DEX began its two digit sales growth up to now.

After record sales this spring, in April, the company announced that it would split three of the shares.

BB&T Capital Markets analyst Krajcik (Scott Krasik) has been tracking the retail situation of footwear, clothing and specialty products since 2003. He said that this is one of the greatest success stories of consumer enterprises, and you can compare it with apple (Apple) in terms of brand concern.

UGG's flagship stores are furnished with double colored Khaki furniture, which has dark ambience lighting and wire drawing. It is more like the Banana Republic shop. It is no match for the humble family stores and petrol stations in Australia.

The name "Ugg" may be called "UGS, uggs or ughs" on different occasions. It can be traced back to the first World War. It was said that Australian pilots were frozen stiff legs in the unpressurized cockpit because they wore "flight boots" (flying uggs) for short, and the boots of the sheepskin boots could reach above their knees.

According to legend, from the late nineteenth Century, the sheepskins began to wrap the sheepskin on their feet to keep warm. In 1920s, they began to describe the word "ugg".

In 1933, a company called Blue Mountains Ugg Boots began producing snow boots in the countryside of Western Sydney.

Otto (Doug Otto) with broad shoulders and square chin is the founder of DEX company and has been chief executive until 2005.

After retiring comfortably, the 59 year old surfer can go all out to chase the waves. He will travel to the best surfing in the world in a whim.

Otto recalled that when we went public in 1993, people called us "only a small horse."

Teva shoes account for 98% of our business - and mainly one of them! UGG lets us turn from single production sandals to produce sandals and sealing shoes, achieving diversification of product mix.

In the past 10 years, UGG boots have broken into the vision of pop culture. From the drama of Sex and the City to the mud of the fortieth Woodstock (Woodstock) Music Festival, it is everywhere.

Kate Moss (Kate Moss) travels in her country cottage in Cotswold (Cotswolds), and in the weather of 80 degrees Fahrenheit, young people wear it around the shopping mall in California.

In 2003, when Rishwain launched a new pink and blue boot for the holiday season, the brand's boots began to meet the demand.

Between 2002 and 2003, sales of UGG rose by 55% to $37 million.

In the next year, sales of UGG climbed to the highest point of 116 million dollars.

Simonton, Professor of Fashion Institute of Technology and member of the American Fashion Designers Association (Council of Fashion Designers of America), said that New York is soaring like a rocket ship.

It is a very good contradiction.

People say it's ugly, but it looks so sexy when it comes to matching beautiful models.

For 45 years, Simonton, a highly respected designer and fashion designer, even found himself in a craze for it. He is looking for a pair of UGG boots for his niece.

He said she had to have a pair of UGG.

Everyone must have a pair - it has become an irresistible symbol of status.

Because UGG can't buy boots in the store, the fans of UGG go to eBay to buy it, which is usually three or four times the retail price.

However, not everyone has to get what they want.

Customers all over the world receive their eagerly awaited boots through international mail, and find it frustrating to find that they are not buying UGG boots, but ordinary snow boots -- many of UGG's Australian competitors produce sheepskin boots.

Although the sheepskin boots have been the characteristic household handicraft products of Australia for decades, their plain image is in sharp contrast to the luxury image created by Dex in the United States, and obviously consumers are not buying them.

Uggs-n-Rugs is a 32 year old sheepskin clothing store in Kenwick, Australia. The boss Bruce MacDougall (Bruce McDougall) and Bronwyn MacDougall (Bronwyn McDougall) still remember the customers returning the boxes through the post office.

Bronwyn recalls that we started selling some products overseas, but people returned them.

She also remembered that she received a notice of ceasing infringement issued by Dex in 2003.

DEX said Mr. MacDougall and other 20 Australian producers used the word ugg in the Australian trademark of DEX.

She said, they say our boots are fake, but in fact DEX is fake! They are liars!

Husband Bruce gently reproached her, you can't say so.

Bronwyn replied with a smile. This is what lawyers often tell me.

Stewart (David Stewart) is one of them.

He is a trademark lawyer in Perth, Perth, Western Australia. He remembers the experience of buying snow boots at a gas station when he was a kid when he was a kid.

He said Australia's sheepskin boots industry is very fragmented.

These people do not have enough money to fight international lawsuits.

He recalled that everyone was listless when he met with several local producers. He said they used the word to describe their products for decades.

All of a sudden, they received bad letters, attacking them with the legal language they could not understand.

Under coercion and confusion, some producers gave up and shut down their businesses, but Mike and Dougall chose to go to court.

They searched some old advertisements, and found some people who had many years of experience to collect testimony. They began to prove that ugg is a generic term and can not be registered as a trademark.

What MacDougall and other people in this industry do not know is that an Australian surfer named Shane Stedman (Shane Stedman) applied for the ugh-boot trademark in 1970, and applied for ugh trademark in 1982. After a few years, the two trademarks were bought by Brian Smith.

Otto said that when we bought UGG from Brian, one of the things we did was to go all over the world and buy trademarks from people in different places.

Soon after, DEX lawyers began sending letters of suspension to all companies around the world.

One of these companies is Koolaburra, an American company that imports leather boots and sells them under the name of "UG".

DEX company sued the company. In 2005, a California judge made a ruling in favor of it.

(DEX company even requested an editor of the Oxford English dictionary to change the interpretation of ugg from "a soft sheepskin boots" to an interpretation including the UGG trade mark.

Otto said, "our aim is to force a couple shop to shut down? Of course not.

But we have established UGG brand goodwill through investment and efforts, and these people have used our goodwill.

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However, the legal battle between Australia and Mr MacDougall was not quick enough, and it was not easy.

An American company is trying to embezzle the symbolic symbol of Australia, which has aroused public nationalism.

The news that DEX company pferred production business to China further aroused people's indignation.

Several politicians intervened in the struggle. They delivered speeches in Congress, wore snowy boots to the rally, and raised money to help MacDougall and the DEX company fight in court.

The lawsuit even gave birth to a documentary entitled "The Good, the Bad &the Ugg Boot" - "a story about cultural identity and survival in the age of globalization."

Otto recalled the past, saying that the media had overdone the fanaticism of the Australian trademark war.

Although DEX does move to China to increase production and cut costs, he also points out that the company will continue to purchase almost all sheepskin in Australia.

As for the Australian origin of snow boots, the surfing experience and three years of retirement have not shaken his pragmatism.

He thought thoughtfully that the Australasian people were very interesting. Vegemite was their national food, but its trademark owner was Kraft Foods, an American company.

I don't think they really realized that.

I think the world has changed.

After two years of litigation, DEX lost the case against MacDougall and his wife.

Theoretically, the American company lost only the "ugh-boot" brand in Australia because it did not use the trademark, but for most Australians, the result was a victory.

Although DEX has not yet paid part of the legal fees that MacDougall and his wife deserve, the couple have not been frustrated.

Stewart said that throughout the 2006 judgment, people can feel fair and feel that the law has made the right decision.

Today, Bronwyn MacDougall serves as secretary of Australian Sheepskin Association and Save Our Aussie Icon.

She said that although she and Bruce were 66 years old, they had not planned to retire.

They are still making hand-made boots and selling them in their stores.

Many of her customers knew her from childhood, and when they just walked, they were led by their parents to buy shoes in the shop.

She said, people walked in and said, "the shoes you made are wonderful -- they are so durable."

Later, people began to want UGG boots instead of ordinary snow boots.

She said that many people who go with the stream must buy this brand of shoes.

DEX spent a lot of money to convince the world that it is the real snow boots.

However, after years of judgement, the facts clearly showed that although the company lost a trademark war in Australia, the company had won a comprehensive victory.

Today, DEX has "ugg" trademark in more than 100 countries, and uses high-tech anti-counterfeiting tools and complex networks composed of lawyers, customs officers, enterprise alliances and private detectives to protect them.

Leah Evert-Burks, a legal consultant and brand protection director at DEX, says counterfeit goods are one of the disasters of popular brands.

I can't even talk openly about some anti-counterfeiting measures.

When you get involved in this field, you will be amazed at what you see.

According to DEX statistics, last year, the company terminated more than 20000 auctions on eBay, closed more than 2500 websites and destroyed about 60000 pairs of fake boots found by customs officials.

Evert burns stressed that the vast majority of them are naked crimes outside China (these fake boots usually stick cheap boots on the outside of their boots, which are supposed to be double faced sheepskin), but Stewart said he will still receive complaints from Australian businessmen who have been hit by fake goods.

The threat of legal proceedings is like a silent key pressed around the globe, and Australia's snowshoe industry's efforts to expand its international market have disappeared.

MacDougall and his wife say they have lost 90% of their international business since 2004.

Their daughter gave up the business after DEX closed her eBay store.

Bronwyn said that almost anyone who sells any word with UG, ugg or ugh violates their trademark rights.

There is no room for debate.

Ordinary Australian sheepskin boots and UGG boots

In fashion, fake goods are commonplace. But when it comes to UGG boots, the line between "fake" and competition is very vague.

The boots on the left are Australian leather boots.

In terms of production, it can be exemplary (using high quality local sheepskin, stitching reinforcement, double bottom, Baotou), but you need to make your own judgement on the labels they want to label.

As for how to identify DEX UGG Australia boots (right side), you can refer to the following characteristics:

Height: UGG Australia classic boots are short (up to calf) and long.

Any other height boots are not real UGG boots.