Fascinating Announcement by Portsmouth

Concerning Kate the Great. Said that there had been a lot of inquiry so that announcement says that recipe for Kate is property of Todd but IP around Kate the Great is property of Portsmouth. Not sure that I see any real value to the IP given that the majority of value/interest is in the beer itself. So brewing a say pilsner and calling it Kate the Great doesn’t seem like it will garner a lot of attention for Portsmouth. Alternatively, Todd brewing his RIS and calling it brand X seems to create an instant following for brand X.

So, should Kate now be officially retired?

Have never heard of someone attempting to attribute IP value per se to the brand name when the real IP value in this case is in the ingredients. Sure, there is a lot of name recognition for Kate, but the value is really in the contents of the bottle as opposed to the name on the label.

Not sure I understand exactly what Portsmouth is doing here or trying to do.

So Portsmouth brews Kate and calls it something else. Surely that will get the NE geeks in line as well.

Lots of info here already and really not much interest in Kate the Great on Ratebeer as compared to Beeradvocate:

http://www.ratebeer.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=208352

Facifuckinating

Daybreak is 600x times better. Better IP protect that shit

IP? WTF? WITWIT?

Originally posted by miketd
So Portsmouth brews Kate and calls it something else. Surely that will get the NE geeks in line as well.

Actually the opposite. Brew something else and call it Kate.

What they should do is just rename the Smuttynose Imperial Stout Kate the Great and then lobby to have ratebeer merge all the ratings into that category.

The only thing that makes sense to me is for Todd to purchase the name. Sounds like a way for Portsmouth to get a little cash from the brewery in Maine.

Originally posted by ContemplateBeer
IP? WTF? WITWIT?

Interested Party??

There is no IP protection for recipes. The only thing that is legally protectable is the branding of the beer. So likely, the brewery continues to brew the beer with the same recipe under the same branding, and the brewer is free to duplicate it as best he can in a new brewery if he wants to. Whenever a brewer leaves a brewery, there is nothing that the brewery can do to stop him from brewing the same beer somewhere else, he just can’t call it the same name without their permission.