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ABITRON AUSTRIA GMBH v. HETRONIC INT’L, INC. 

JACKSON, J., concurring 

function of a trademark.1 

In brief, once the marks on its bags are serving their core
source-identifying  function  in  commerce  in  the  United
States, this German company is doing—domestically—ex-
actly what Congress sought to proscribe.  Accordingly, the 
German company may be subject to liability for this domes-
tic conduct—i.e., it cannot successfully obtain dismissal of
the lawsuit on extraterritoriality grounds—even though it
never sold the bags in, or directly into, the United States.2 
Guided by this understanding of “use in commerce,” I join

the Court’s opinion in full. 

—————— 

1 Trademarks  facilitate  the  accumulation  of  business  goodwill  when-
ever and wherever marked goods are in commerce.  The manufacturer of 
source-marked goods reaps a goodwill benefit to the extent that consum-
ers like its product, see Two Pesos, Inc. v. Taco Cabana, Inc., 505 U. S. 
763, 774 (1992), and that benefit runs to the manufacturer whenever a 
trademark is serving a source-identifying function with respect to items
in commerce—however that commercial status came to be. 

2 I will not attempt to discuss every way in which a marked item might
be “in commerce” such that the trademark is being used “in the ordinary
course of trade” domestically.  §1127.  But, in the internet age, one could 
imagine a mark serving its critical source-identifying function in domes-
tic  commerce  even  absent  the  domestic  physical  presence  of  the  items 
whose source it identifies.  See, e.g., 5 J. McCarthy, Trademarks and Un-
fair Competition §29:56 (5th ed. Supp. 2023) (“The use of an infringing 
mark as part of an Internet site available for use in the United States 
may constitute an infringement of the mark in the United States”); 4 id., 
§25:54.50 (“When an alleged infringing mark is used on the internet, the
use is clearly a ‘use in commerce’ ”); 1 id., §3:7 (discussing “evidence of
use as a trademark” where “a designation is prominently displayed in a
way  easily  recognized  by  web  users  as  an  indicator  of  origin”;  accord, 
In re Sones, 590 F. 3d 1282, 1288 (CA Fed. 2009) (observing, with respect 
to the use-in-commerce requirement, that  a “ ‘website [can be] an elec-
tronic  retail  store,  and  the  web  page  [can  be]  a  shelf-talker  or  banner 
which encourages the consumer to buy the product’ ”).