Peruvian businesswoman María Carolina Herrera Herrera has won a legal battle against Venezuelan designer Carolina Herrera after the latter used her surname in the brand name of her soap business.
Ironically, the woman lives in Ate-Vitarte, and her house is numbered 212, like Herrera’s perfume line.
María Carolina uses the money from “La Jabonera by María Herrera” to pay for the sterilization of abandoned animals. “To leave a better world; in the end the money is mine,” she said in a recent interview with the Peruvian news program Panorama.
Unlike her namesake, who makes billions in sales from more than 350 stores around the world, she has just 136 followers on Instagram and doesn’t like cameras.
Peruvian businesswoman named Carolina Herrera won legal dispute against the designer over the use of her name
The legal dispute
The only thing that unites them is the two-year legal dispute at the National Institute for the Defense of Competition and the Protection of Intellectual Property (INDECOPI) for the commercial use of the surname they share.
“Carolina Herrera is my name, it is on my ID and I am Peruvian. I have every right to use it as I see fit and as I see fit,” she told the aforementioned media outlet.
The registration of her trademark was a gift from her son, Darío Morales, a law graduate. “He wanted to surprise me for Christmas and register the trademark. Shortly after, I received a notification from a lawyer who said: ‘Madam, don’t you want me to advise you on the problem you have with INDECOPI?’ And I said: What!’” she recalled.
In November 2021, Carolina Herrera Ltd. submitted a document to stop the registration of the trademark “La Jabonera by María Herrera”, which had requested registration for various products such as whitening preparations, non-medicated soaps and perfumery products, stating that they are dedicated to products in the same category.
Peruvian businesswoman named Carolina Herrera won legal dispute against the designer over the use of her name
Her son encouraged her to keep going
The Peruvian company, legally represented by the owner’s son, argued that “Herrera” is a distinctive term and that having that surname does not give anyone the right to obtain a trademark registration with this name.
Furthermore, in Peru, “Herrera” does not enjoy any special distinctiveness, as both brands have differences, and it is a common surname. He also mentioned that a brand made up of a surname does not prevent people who share it from using it to identify themselves in civil matters.
“I knew it was Carolina Herrera, that there is a law firm that handles the cases in each country. When I first appealed, I said: ‘that’s it,’ but my son told me ‘we’re going to fight it,'” the woman said.
INDECOPI ultimately ruled in favor of the local business, resolving that there was no risk of confusion between the two brands, since their signs were not similar. In addition, the American company uses the name “Carolina Herrera,” while the Peruvian brand uses “María Herrera.”
The ruling concluded that granting exclusive rights to the surname “Herrera” to Carolina Herrera would have unfairly limited the use of that surname by other individuals in commercial activities.
