Copy caterpillar cakes, stolen concepts, and dubious designs: Why and how you should protect YOUR intellectual property

Once upon a time there was a caterpillar. A chocolate cake caterpillar called Colin, and everyone loved to eat it. The end.

Except it wasn’t.

While Colin (plus cake-y life partner Connie) was the original and highly popular tea-time birthday treat from M&S, when Aldi introduced a very similar but cheaper offering called Cuthbert, it turned into a legal battle between the supermarkets that was anything but the stuff of buttercream and happy endings. 

In fact, there was a creeping army of imitators suddenly on the scene, including Waitrose's Cecil, Sainsbury's Wiggles, Tesco's Curly, and Asda's Clyde the Caterpillar. And let’s not forget other disputes regarding the shape of a Swiss chocolate bar, and the curious naming of a local supermarket that looked a bit too much like another much more well-known one.

It led to the memorable IP (intellectual property) high court cake battle of 2021 (we’ll provide the proper ending to that story later!).

And we know that opener may sound playful and glib, but an IP infringement has the potential to be extremely damaging to any business dealing in “stuff” – which is why you need to make sure your trademarks and copyright are up to scratch and protected from potential copycats invading your product and ideas turf. 

In this article, we’ll cover how specific IP insurance ensures nobody can get away with stealing your ideas.

What is intellectual property?

According to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO),  intellectual property (IP) refers to “creations of the mind, such as inventions; literary and artistic works; designs; and symbols, names and images used in commerce.”

Legal protections should be put in place for patents, copyright, and trademarks. Not only does this allow the correct people to properly benefit, but it protects them from infringements and replicas that are deemed as too close to the original. 

And it’s more than cake designs. Intellectual property – particularly in this fast-moving digital age – covers concepts, innovations, music, trade secrets (the recipe of a certain cola drink, for example), computer coding, branding, designs and aesthetics (cue the caterpillar cake) and even the use of a quirky celebrity name (be careful who you call Doja Cat). 

The important thing is to put a firm stake in the ground early and make sure it’s your name and trademark that marks the spot.

Discover more about this from Howden here.

How do I better safeguard my IP world?

With IP being a key foundation of everything your business represents, protecting it at all costs is as big a priority as insuring your premises against flooding, fire, and theft. In fact, the theft of ideas is a harder thing to recover from than tangible goods in many cases.

The best way to ensure that you have the cake you created and get to choose who eats it is to secure yourself and lock up your IP with specific intellectual property insurance - providing legal protection and a financial safety net should anyone try and take or duplicate what’s yours. 

And in the end…

Having made it all the way to the High Court, the Colin and Cuthbert dispute was finally settled when Aldi agreed to perform some key facial and body surgery to their version so aesthetically there was no confusion between the two. 

But while cake wars may be over between these two retail giants, there’s a salient lesson within this for businesses of all sizes pertaining to why IP protection is so critical. If M&S had not challenged Aldi, then there may have been many more brand and design infringements to follow. In this memorable case, all pretenders will think twice before manufacturing something almost identical.

Oscar Wilde famously said: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery”. Which is nice, but not the case with IP issues!

Find out how you can escape ‘The Imitation Game’ and call Howden’s specialist IP team today on 0330 008 1334. And we promise, all you’ll get is original thinking and solutions.