Since 2022, I have been trapped in an unnecessarily protracted and expensive trademark dispute with the world’s largest cosmetics and personal care business which has caused untold damage to my small business. Here’s a summary of events.

1. In 2009, I founded my East Midlands specialist waxing business, nkd ( ) waxing and opened our first salon in Nottingham city centre. In the same year, I successfully trademarked the nkd ( ) name in Class 44 of the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) and we worked hard to develop a distinct brand for nkd ( ) and a whole brand identity around it. 

2. In 2010, the Urban Decay makeup brand, which is owned by French cosmetics conglomerate L’Oreal, launched in the UK. Included within Urban Decay’s range are a number of specific makeup items, mostly eyeshadow palettes, marketed under the “NAKED” trademark.

3. Over the next decade, between 2009 and 2019, nkd ( ) evolved and grew. We opened a training arm of the business to teach other therapists and salon owners how to wax like an expert, we opened a second specialist waxing salon in Leicester city centre and we won a lot of awards. In 2019 we celebrated our 10^th birthday in Nottingham on a high. Around the same time our nkd ( ) trademark naturally expired, as all UK trademarks do after ten years.

4. In 2020, like all other businesses, nkd was thrown into crisis mode with the arrival of covid 19. Amidst the chaos, I missed the deadline by which I could automatically renew my nkd ( ) trademark. This meant that when I would eventually come to reapply for it, I would essentially have to start the trademark application from scratch.

5. nkd’s salon business was hit extremely hard by the pandemic. I used some of the time when our Nottingham and Leicester beauty & waxing salons were forcibly shut to branch out into product development. The resultant range of waxing and hair removal aftercare products is aimed at anyone who chooses to remove their body and/or intimate hair via waxing, shaving, epilating or any other form of hair removal and will help keep hair-free areas soft, smooth, silky, and lump & bump free inbetween treatments. We took the opportunity of the product launch to revisit and update our original nkd ( ) branding, including moving our brackets from nkd ( ) to (nkd). Our new product brand was different from our old salon brand, but no less distinctive or original.

6. In 2022, I reapplied for the nkd trademarks in Class 44 again (which covers salons and services) as well as Class 3 (to cover the products).

7. L’Oreal, the world’s largest cosmetics and personal care company opposed the registration of all of my trademarks on the basis of its Urban Decay NAKED eyeshadow palettes and small amount of other make-up. L’Oreal, which is valued at over US$250 billion, said I had to withdraw my trademark applications, and even stop using the nkd name altogether - not only across my new product range but also across my very established and popular salons. L’Oreal even went as far to say that if I was successful in re-registering my nkd trademarks, this could affect the purchasing behaviours of its own customers and so could negatively affect sales of its NAKED make up.

8. Because of the amount of investment and hard work I had put into my brand since 2009, as well as the reputation that my own small business had built up locally, and - more importantly - because I knew I had done nothing wrong - I refused to comply with L’Oreal’s demands to withdraw my trademark applications and change the name of my business.

9. L’Oreal’s opposition to the registration of the nkd trademarks in Classes 3 and 44 could be considered particularly strange given how many other trademarks – even those which include the word NAKED in their name have been successfully registered in Class 3 – and even in the specific area of cosmetics and/or make up! A list of some of those trademarks can be found here, along with examples of many other beauty and make up products which have NAKED in their name. I believe this proves that no single entity – not even the giant that is L’Oreal – can (nor should be able to) lay claim to a single word across such a huge market and industry, let alone derivatives and other versions of that word, or slightly similar words.
   
   
   
10.  Since then, a lengthy, stressful and very expensive negotiation (“cooling off”) period has taken place during which nkd and L’Oreal tried to come to a “co-existence agreement” which would have meant that both brands could continue to operate without infringing on the other, as had been the case for the previous 12 – 13 years.

11. To date, this trademark dispute has cost me almost £30,000 plus VAT in direct legal fees, which for a small, independent business, has been crippling. Very sadly, I ended up closing my once thriving and successful Nottingham city centre waxing salon at the end of 2023, as I could no longer cope with the financial pressures and workload demands of running the 2 salons, and trying to launch a new product line, alongside defending myself against L’Oreal and of course caring for my children and family.

12. I now know that my business is not the only small business to fall victim to L’Oreal and what some would call an unreasonable and overly-aggressive stance of its NAKED trademark. In 2017, over 2,000 people signed a petition to Stop L’Oreal from damaging local, small business after L'Oreal mounted a challenge against a Scottish Soap and Bath Bomb manufacturer also called NAKED. Sadly, that Scottish Bath Bomb company is no longer trading.

13. I also now know that L’Oreal puts huge efforts into promoting what an ethical company it is. Officially called The Way we Act, L’Oreal’s Code of Ethics is 54 pages long and translated into 30 different languages. The Code of Ethics makes claims such as

14. I believe that L’Oreal should be publicly called out for the extent to which its behaviour and actions over the course of this trademark dispute violates its own Code of Ethics. In fact L’Oreal actually encourages members of the public to report any ethical breaches via it’s own “Speak Up” website and hold it to an account as a company. “Our Speak Up website allows … representatives of civil society to raise any serious ethical concerns they may have so that we can address them,” the company says. “Reports made via this platform will be received by L’Oréal’s Office of the Chief Ethics Officer.”

If you agree that L’Oreal’s actions against nkd and other small businesses may be unethical, please consider submitting your concern via the Speak Up website. There is a specific category for Violation to Code of Ethics and/or other ethical policies.

https://www.lorealspeakup.com/

15. The situation right now (at the time of writing in summer 2024) is that this dispute continues and we are now waiting for a tribunal to decide the outcome of this case. I have been advised that this tribunal may not take place until 2025. Until then, our Leicester city centre beauty & waxing salon remains very much open for business. The wax training arm of nkd is still running wax training courses. And our essential waxing and hair removal aftercare products remain on sale, both to members of the public, and to other beauty salons and therapists who would like to recommend and sell essential waxing aftercare products to their own clients.