Judge rules for Original Oyster House in Gulf Shores name case

<p>A federal judge has ordered a new Gulf Shores eatery not to call itself The Oyster House because of the confusion it may create with the Original Oyster House restaurant just down the road.</p><p>The ruling Monday by U.S. District Judge Kristi DuBose came in a trademark infringement suit filed by Superb Food Inc., which owns the Original Oyster House that opened in 1983, against The Oyster House, an Atlanta-area business that recently opened the rival about three miles away on the Alabama coast.</p><p>Blake Lowe, an attorney for the new restaurant, said Tuesday a neon sign that says "The Oyster House" will be changed to give the full name: The Oyster House Piano Bar and Grill.</p><p>He said other signs, menus and marketing will reflect the full name.</p><p>David Quittmeyer, an attorney for Superb Food, said the new restaurant should remove "Oyster House" from its name altogether to avoid confusion. The judge's ruling, a temporary restraining order, did not specifically banish those two words, but Quittmeyer indicated the litigation may continue if they remain.</p><p>"What they change it to, they change it at their peril," he told the Press-Register, which first reported the order.</p><p>Lowe said "Oyster House" is a generic term and that the change to the full name should end any confusion.</p><p>"People can either read or they can't," he said.</p><p>DuBose said there was no evidence that the new restaurant intended to benefit from the similarity of its name with that of a successful local business. But she said there was ample evidence that customers were confused by the similarity of the names.</p><p>DuBose noted her order was a temporary one for an immediate change and that it does not address whether the new restaurant's modification, whatever it says or looks like, would infringe on the trademark or not.</p>