After a young Danish boy died of cancer in 2004, his family requested that his urn be modeled after his favorite sports car - the Ferrari. The funeral home contacted a local Ferrari dealer, and the dealer obliged, even sending him a prancing horse emblem and some Ferrari stickers.
Ferrari, perceiving the piece of art as marketing for the funeral home, sued the 4-person company for $46,000, claiming misuse of the Ferrari trademark.
Is Ferrari looking for bad publicity? I understand business and the protection of trademarks, but they weren’t using the Ferrari brand for financial gain, and they were only trying to fulfill a dying boy’s dream, and “[going] the extra mile to help this family,” says Carzten Mark, the owner of the Begravelses Service funeral home.
Whoever made this terrible decision needs to step down and get real. We all know Enzo wouldn’t have put up with this if he were here today.
On a business level, if Ferrari loses one sale from this, they already lost money, as the $46,000 settlement is much less than the cost of a Ferrari. And we know that if anybody in that family (or group of friends) is wealthy and in the mood for a sports car, they would not buy a Ferrari after this incident. Not only that, but in the case that Ferrari loses the court battle to be held in October (and let’s hope they do lose,) then the only thing they got out of this was a bunch of bad press and lost respect.
Who put this guy in charge?
Source: AFP
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