TWO DIRECTORS of the Brennans bakery company have denied the company deliberately copied the packaging used in a brown bread product of rival bakers McCambridge’s.
Derek Beatty and Ivan Hammond were giving evidence in the action in which McCambridge’s Ltd are suing Joseph Brennan Bakeries, trading as Brennans, over alleged infringement of its copyright on the packaging of a stone-ground wholewheat bread.
It is claimed Brennans is “passing off” its product as McCambridge’s by putting it into similar packaging to that used by McCambridge’s.
McCambridge’s has a 30 per cent market share for wholewheat bread, while Brennans has 13 per cent, the court heard.
Brennans claims it wanted to increase sales of its wholewheat product and decided to package it in resealable bags. The company said it got three designers to present new packaging ideas before choosing one to relaunch the product on a limited basis last January, before going nationwide to over 3,000 stores in April.
McCambridge’s, which pioneered resealable packaging for bread here, said its current packaging was in use since early 2008.
Michael McCambridge, chairman of McCambridge’s, told the court last week his concern was that people who normally buy their bread would be confused by the Brennans packaging and buy the rival product by mistake.
Yesterday, Mr Beatty told the court he “absolutely refuted” Mr McCambridge’s claim that Brennans deliberately copied the McCambridge packaging.
Asked by his counsel Declan McGrath what he thought of Mr McCambridge’s evidence that the Brennans product was “parasitic”, he said he took offence at it.
Cross-examined by Anthony Aston SC, for McCambridge’s, Mr Beatty disagreed the packaging chosen by Brennans for the relaunch was “confusingly similar” to the McCambridge packaging. Asked what he thought of 10 customers having complained to McCambridge’s about confusing packaging, he said consumers make errors but thought the number involved was very low.
Mr Hammond said he “totally refuted” the claim Brennans deliberately copied the McCambridge packaging or had any intention to mimic it in the redesign.
Under cross-examination, he said a key objective outlined for the designers was that it should clearly differentiate the Brennans product from competitors.
The hearing before Mr Justice Michael Peart continues.