Opinion ID: 795959
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The District Court's Treatment of the Frisch Factors

Text: 14 The district court held that Lanard's ATK vehicle grille design infringed on the Hummer Nose Design trademark (Trademark No. 1,959,544). Lanard's primary objection to the summary judgment against them on the infringement of the '544 trademark was the failure by the district court to discuss any of the Frisch factors in its judgment. [N]ot all of these factors may be particularly helpful in any given case. But a thorough and analytical treatment must nevertheless be attempted. Daddy's Junky Music Stores, 109 F.3d at 280. Lanard argues that no such thorough and 2 analytical treatment was given to the trademark infringement claim in this case. General Motors responds by noting that [t]his Court reviews judgments, not opinions, In re Big Rivers Elec. Corp., 355 F.3d 415, 442 (6th Cir. 2004), and argues that there is no need for a detailed analysis because all factors favor a likelihood of confusion. Despite General Motors's contention, Lanard's argument appears to be a correct one. 15 Daddy's Junky Music Stores advises a court to conduct a thorough and analytical treatment of the Frisch factors. The district court may have conducted such a treatment, but it has given no indication of its analysis and what reasoning it used to arrive at its conclusion in either its order, or the transcript of the summary judgment hearing. This leaves a reviewing court little to work with in determining whether the trademark infringement claim was deserving of judgment as a matter of law. Daddy's Junky Music Stores requires that the district court make express factual findings as to the Frisch likelihood-of-confusion factors. 109 F.3d at 280. With that said, the district court erred in not conducting a proper discussion of the Frisch factors. However, because we review a summary judgment motion de novo, the district court's silence is not, standing alone, a reversible error and we must now conduct a de novo review of the likelihood-of-confusion factors.