The Quiznos-Subway “Battle Royale”
Tuesday, February 5th, 2008
If you haven’t seen it yet, there’s an interesting advertising dispute brewing between Quiznos and Subway sandwich shops. It seems Quiznos invited the public to submit homemade videos in a contest intended to target its rival, Subway. The contest rules stated that video submissions were meant to draw “a comparison between Quiznos and Subway with Quiznos being superior.”
One of the videos showed a Subway sandwich running to a Quiznos store to find more meat. Another showed two submarines looking like sandwiches, with the Subway submarine being destroyed because it did not have enough meat.
Subway subsequently sued Quiznos, alleging that several of the homemade videos made false claims and depicted its brand in a disparaging manner. In addition, Subway also objected to ads that Quiznos itself created, showing people on the street choosing Quiznos over Subway. The legal question here is because Quiznos did not create the submissions, so should it be held liable for user-generated content created on its behalf?
From a claim substantiation standpoint (assuming that the “more meat” claim is one of the false statements), I wouldn’t want to be the attorney representing Quiznos in this one. You see, knowledge is a dangerous thing. In my opinion, once an advertiser is made aware that claims are being disseminated in the marketplace without the prerequisite underlying support, the advertiser is responsible and must exercise a reasonable effort to remove the videos/ads from circulation. As Richard Leighton, a partner at Keller and Heckman who specializes in advertising and trademark law noted in a New York Times article: “It’s not like Quiznos said, ‘Do any interesting video you can.’ They provoked it, instigated it, so it may be that the consumers, in this case, are effectively their agents.” (more…)
Let’s face it, Washington is not known for being hip, but last night’s party held at Google’s D.C. office was very cool. They were celebrating the opening of their Government Affairs office and I was thrilled to be invited. U.S. Representatives, FCC Commissioners, business leaders and a sea of 30-somethings bent on improving the world sipped on “YouTubes” (a cocktail concoction) and munched on sushi, while Xbox games played on walls throughout the office draped with dramatic colors and distinctive furniture.
My mother always told me that it was inappropriate to discuss religion and politics. I thus find it fascinating that when she’s not talking about the Pittsburgh Steelers, she’s usually discussing those two very topics. As a current resident of Washington, D.C., I’m beginning to see how crazy things are going to get here over the next year. With MySpace’s primary, the Iowa Caucus and the New Hampshire Primary all taking place in the past few days, I thought it may be the right time to throw my hat into the ring of one of the two unmentionable topics: politics.
Some say that ERA appears to have abandoned its original DRTV members in favor of online technologies and advancements. I want to say without any qualms that ERA has not abandoned the DRTV segment of the membership at all. Indeed, DRTV is alive and well at ERA and the association’s commitment to it is demonstrated in many of its offerings, from education and research to the self-regulatory program, and to government affairs advocacy.
Before the holidays, the FTC invited a small group of industry representatives to preview their tutorial for ways businesses can protect the personal information that they collect. Frankly, I didn’t look forward to attending what I thought would be yet another boring presentation on data security. Boy was I wrong! The FTC actually produced a video that even our industry would be proud of. It’s interactive, it’s fun, and it was developed with the intended audience in mind.
It was bad enough when a large brick-and-mortar retailer told members of Congress at last week’s hearing on Streamlined Sales Tax (SST) that online retailers have an unfair advantage over companies like his. Indeed, the entire argument surrounding SST is one of evenhandedness across selling channels. The debate is complex and often touches on seemingly contradictory or ambiguous points. But what really floored me was when a Congressman in support of this retailer’s testimony remarked that he missed the days when he could walk into a store and yep, you guessed it, “everyone knew his name.”
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