Chinese Trademark Office Refuses Registration for “FRACOGNAC” Mark

The Chinese Trademark Office refusal to file Shenzhen Ying Jun Wine Company's mark "FRACOGNAC" because this is a geographic index continues a tradition of strict enrollment standards in geographical indexes despite China's occasionally lax enforcement in other places.

China, a nation where the location of source of a great is often as significant to consumers as the firm making the goods, will refuse to file a logo that includes a geographical indication if this sign is deceptive or untrue. The Chinese wine and spirit business Shenzhen Ying Jun tried to register the symbol "FRACOGNAC," a mark that the Bureau National Interprofessionnel du Cognac (BNIC) as well as the Institut National de l'Origine et de la Qualite (INAO) opposed.

This is actually the second time Shenzhen Ying Jun has had a mark for "FRACOGNAC" within Category 33 of the Nice Convention (Alcoholic Drinks except beer) refused. In both applications the BNIC and INAO claimed, and the Chinese Trademark Office (CTO) concurred the usage of FRA, a common index for the French Republic, together with the geographical index Cognac would mislead the people, even whenever merchandise were plainly marked with another source in Chinese.

BNIC and INAO closely protects cognac as a standard of quality, a common characteristic among geographical indexes in addition to a geographical index. Cognac is a brandy for the wine growing region enclosing the town of Cognac in southwestern France named. Along with being made from grapes grown in the area it must fulfill unique distilling conditions for the "cognac" mark. China has a big marketplace for the beverage, which has supported national production of brandy in the cognac fashion.

National brand protection was created by China in 1979 and has since become a signatory of the TRIPS Agreement as well as an associate of the Paris Union. Chinese brand law forbids the registration of a symbol that indicates a geographical source when the goods being signified by that symbol don't originate from that geographic region.