Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
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529US1

Unit: $U38

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210 WAL-MART STORES, INC. v. SAMARA BROTHERS, INC.

Opinion of the Court

or ‘device’ almost anything at all that is capable of carrying
is not restrictive.”
meaning, this language, read literally,
Qualitex Co. v. Jacobson Products Co., 514 U. S. 159, 162
(1995). This reading of § 2 and § 43(a) is buttressed by a
recently added subsection of § 43(a), § 43(a)(3), which refers
speciﬁcally to “civil action[s] for trade dress infringement
under this chapter for trade dress not registered on the prin-
15 U. S. C. § 1125(a)(3) (1994 ed., Supp. V).
cipal register.”
The text of § 43(a) provides little guidance as to the
circumstances under which unregistered trade dress may
be protected.
It does require that a producer show that
the allegedly infringing feature is not “functional,” see § 43
(a)(3), and is likely to cause confusion with the product
for which protection is sought, see § 43(a)(1)(A), 15 U. S. C.
§ 1125(a)(1)(A). Nothing in § 43(a) explicitly requires a pro-
ducer to show that its trade dress is distinctive, but courts
have universally imposed that requirement, since without
distinctiveness the trade dress would not “cause confusion
. . . as to the origin, sponsorship, or approval of [the] goods,”
as the section requires. Distinctiveness is, moreover, an
explicit prerequisite for registration of trade dress under
§ 2, and “the general principles qualifying a mark for regis-
tration under § 2 of the Lanham Act are for the most part
applicable in determining whether an unregistered mark
is entitled to protection under § 43(a).” Two Pesos, Inc.
v. Taco Cabana, Inc., 505 U. S. 763, 768 (1992) (citations
omitted).

In evaluating the distinctiveness of a mark under § 2 (and
therefore, by analogy, under § 43(a)), courts have held that a
mark can be distinctive in one of two ways. First, a mark
is inherently distinctive if “[its] intrinsic nature serves to
In the context of word
identify a particular source.”
marks, courts have applied the now-classic test originally
formulated by Judge Friendly, in which word marks that are
“arbitrary” (“Camel” cigarettes), “fanciful” (“Kodak” ﬁlm), or
“suggestive” (“Tide” laundry detergent) are held to be inher-

Ibid.