Utah
Utah’s cookie wars heat up: Dirty Dough counters Crumbl’s claims, cites financial harm
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SALT LAKE CITY — Soiled Dough is firing again at its competitor within the persevering with saga of Utah’s cookie wars.
The cookie startup requested to file a counterclaim in a lawsuit initiated by Crumbl, claiming the authorized battle has value Soiled Dough cash. The corporate is asking the courtroom for monetary reduction from its competitor.
Soiled Dough mentioned the 2 firms had a enterprise relationship that “soured and ended” after Crumbl filed its lawsuit nearly one yr in the past.
At this level, the cookie firm has solely requested Utah District Court docket Decide Howard C. Nelson Jr. to permit it to file the counterclaim previous the deadline — but it surely included the counterclaim within the submitting. Soiled Dough officers mentioned they solely not too long ago found the knowledge that led them to this determination.
Crumbl’s recipe
The so-called “Utah cookie wars” started in Could 2022 when Crumbl filed a federal lawsuit accusing rivals Soiled Dough and Crave Cookie Co. of what it calls “confusingly related” logos, web sites and different advertising supplies. The lawsuit additionally accused Soiled Dough of copying recipes — claiming the founder’s brother is a former Crumbl worker.
Crumbl’s lawsuit particulars web sites, packaging and menu options it believes Crave and Soiled Dough have taken from them. It contains sections with close-up footage of cookies, a cookie brand with a chunk taken out of it, lengthy packing containers that completely match cookies aspect by aspect, and related cookie recipes and presentation equivalent to key lime cookies with white frosting and lime wedges on prime or sugar cookies made with fruity cereal.
The lawsuit additionally claims that each rival companies have copied Crumbl’s “distinctive weekly rotating menu idea.”
The lawsuit in opposition to Crave can be nonetheless ongoing; discovery in that case is about to finish on April 24, and a jury trial is scheduled for early 2024.
Soiled Dough’s recipe
The competitors’s counterclaim begins by mentioning that Crumbl has “tons of of places,” producing “tons of of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in income” annually whereas Soiled Dough, as a small startup, had simply three places when the lawsuit was filed.
Soiled Dough alleges that Crumbl prompted it monetary hurt by submitting the lawsuit, together with lack of traders, lack of ability to acquire loans, authorized prices and elevated vendor prices.
The corporate additionally claims Crumbl filed the lawsuit in opposition to an organization it noticed as a direct competitor “with out vital market share and with restricted monetary assets to struggle their claims,” and mentioned Crumbl ought to have recognized the lawsuit wouldn’t succeed however filed it anyway “in an try and stifle progress and competitors.”
The corporate requested the courtroom to permit it to hunt cash from Crumbl for the losses it has seen due to the lawsuit.
The counterclaim states that the 2 firms had been neither the primary nor the one firms to promote recent cookies in fitted packing containers, from brightly lit or trendy shops, for supply or in rotating menus.
It says the Soiled Dough product pictures shared within the preliminary lawsuit had been posted earlier than people who Crumbl claims it copied.
Soiled Dough says Crumbl’s commerce costume and logos certified for registration as a result of they’re distinctive — and not one of the commonalities between the best way the 2 firms promote cookies are distinctive to the 2 firms. To help this declare, it famous Crumbl’s lawsuit in opposition to Crave Cookies.
The counterclaim states Crumbl requires lease phrases holding different cookie firms out of comparable areas and has a financial curiosity in stopping competitors.
Soiled Dough mentioned the greater than six-month delay in submitting its countersuit is “quick in comparison with the lifetime of the case.” The movement was submitted to the courtroom on Thursday, and Crumbl has not issued a response.
The case is about for a miscellaneous listening to on April 24; two extra hearings are set for April 26 and Could 4, for attorneys to dispute a movement from Crumbl asking for a preliminary injunction — a courtroom order requiring Soiled Dough to cease utilizing advertising, recipes and logos it claims are too related or equivalent to Crumbl’s logos whereas the case is pending.
Initially, Soiled Dough appeared to embrace the lawsuit in its advertising marketing campaign with billboards highlighting it. One mentioned “Cookies so good we’re being sued!” whereas one other mentioned, “We do not file lawsuits, we simply have higher cookies!”
The corporate’s web site now says it has 15 open places, with 40 extra on the best way.
Close to the tip of 2022, Soiled Dough founder Bennett Maxwell informed KSL that the corporate had a rise in gross sales after the lawsuit, calling it “the perfect factor that might have occurred to us.”
That recipe for achievement, although, might have modified, because the lawsuit continues and the corporate faces new monetary challenges — for which it blames the lawsuit.