Navigating Trademark Challenges: A Reflection on the Future of NTH Watches

In June 2023 I received communication from legal counsel to Tudor Watch USA, LLC, alerting me to the existence of Tudor’s trademark registrations for the design of some handsets we’ve been using.

You can see those designs and the trademarks by clicking this link and searching for 6542646 and 6482245.

Obviously, I wasn’t aware of these trademarks’ existence. I wasn’t even aware it was possible to trademark a handset in wide use by other companies.

After spending more than a week discussing this with my own legal counsel, and having had to explain things to my employees and retail partners, I’m exhausted from talking about it.

Knowing that these matters will inevitably become fodder for public discussion, I am anticipating people may want to contact me for more information, or ask me to comment publicly, and perhaps ask about the future of my business.

First, I want to thank everyone and anyone who cares enough to express their support. I am truly grateful.

Second, I hope everyone can understand that by the time this story becomes public, I’ll already be tired of discussing it, and likely won’t have time to respond to everyone individually. Please forgive me for instead using this as my one-size-fits-all reply to both the public discussion and any private inquiries.

The unfortunate reality is that my business doesn’t have the resources to wage a protracted legal battle to dispute the matter. So, regardless of our disagreement, we have stopped making watches with those handsets.

Hopefully we’ll be able to continue making beautiful watches without having to make additional design modifications demanded by larger competitors and their army of lawyers.

Thank you again for your continued support of me and my business. We plan to continue delivering happiness to our customers for the foreseeable future. In fact, you may be interested in our upcoming release of Legends Series Subs (featuring un-trademarked sword hands), with an expected release date next month (August 2023).

Chris Vail
NTH Watches