The Swiss Administrative Court has provided a detailed overview of the principles of registration of geographical indications and generic trade marks in Case B-7412/2006, 1 October 2008, in which Mineralbrunnen Überkingen-Teinach AG sought to extend its international registration for the word mark AFRI-COLA to Switzerland for various goods in Classes 29 and 30; the Federal Institute of Intellectual Property refused extension, considering that AFRI-COLA was (i) a geographical denomination; (ii) partially descriptive of the goods in question and (iii) deceptive to the extent that the goods were not of African origin.

The Federal Administrative Court, reversing this decision in part, allowed extension of the registration in respect of ices and ice cream, tapioca, bread, flour, honey, mustard, vinegar, chocolate, durable sweets, waffles and candy (Class 30) but refused registration for everything else. As to the prefix AFRI-, the Court stated that, since African countries are not trading partners with Switzerland for those Class 30 goods, local consumers would not expect to find such goods of African origin on the Swiss market. The mark did not function as a geographical denomination with respect to such goods and could be registered as a trade mark. The same could not be said of goods such as coffee, tea, cocoa, sugar, spices, salt, rice, flour and preparations made from cereals such as maize and couscous, which are imported in considerable quantities from African countries. For those goods AFRI-COLA was descriptive of geographical origin and the mark would be misleading if used on goods not originating from Africa. Aas to the suffix COLA, the Court considered that the mark would be deceptive for goods that do not contain caffeine, which is contained in cola nuts.

Source: Peter Heinrich, Staiger Schwald & Partner AG, Zurich, writing in World Trademark Report.