A short while ago I came across a flyer advertising a range of frozen foods and one in particular caught my eye as being too cheap to be true. Farmfoods frozen beef burgers carried both Quality Meat Scotland’s ‘Scotch Beef’ assurance mark and the EU protected geographical indication (PGI) logo. Packs of 16 beef burgers were advertised at 4 for £10.
Food Marketing and Brands
Food marketing law, brands and regulatory framework for artisan and small scale producers. Labelling, QUIDs, EU and UK protected food names, IP rights.
Sorry Chobani, I always understood ‘Greek yoghurt’ came from Greece, that’s why we have ‘Greek style yoghurt’. Chobani’s views about what people think are, like its yoghurt, a US import.
FAGE began producing yoghurt in the late 1920s and since the mid-1980s has imported TOTAL yoghurt, the brand name used in the UK, from Greece. FAGE accounts for 95% of all Greek yoghurt sold in the UK. The remaining 5% being mainly Tesco and Asda own-label Greek yoghurt also imported from Greece.
The need to implement Directive 2012/12/EU and the desire to make life simpler for fruit drink producers were the driving forces behind The Fruit Juices and Fruit Nectars (England) Regulations 2013. The 2013 Regulations give effect to the Directive and consolidate, with the removal of minor ‘gold plating’ and as a part of the Red Tape Challenge, all the earlier regulations into a single set which came into force on 20 November 2013.
It is rare for a case on food law to reach the Supreme Court. We have followed closely the case of Torfaen County Borough Council v Douglas Willis Limited which raised a point of law of public importance in relation to 'use by' dates on food and judgement was finally handed down last Wednesday, 31 July 2013.
Torfaen County Borough Council v Douglas Willis Limited came before The Supreme Court, the highest in the land, last Tuesday, 9 July 2013, by way of an appeal from the Divisional Court. The issues for the Court to consider were the construction of regulation 44(1)(d) of The Food Labelling Regulations 1996. In particular, whether the offence of selling food with an expired ‘use by’ date requires proof that the food was at the time of the offence highly perishable and likely to constitute an immediate danger to human health; and whether a ‘use by’ date ceases to have effect once the food has been frozen.
In 2011 Torfaen County Borough Council brought a prosecution against Douglas Willis Limited for a number of offences, all similar in nature, contrary to regulation 44(1)(d) of the Food Labelling Regulations 1996. This is the regulation that makes it an offence where any person “sells any food after the date shown in a ‘use by’ date relating to it”. Torfaen alleged that Willis had sold frozen pigs’ tongues after their ‘use by’ date. Artisan Food Law covered the case in early 2012.
On 26 March 2013 the High Court handed down judgement in FAGE UK Limited v Chobani UK Limited which proved to be a classic passing-off case, only this time the subject was yoghurt.
Passing-off is an old common law remedy concerned with the protection of reputation and goodwill from misrepresentations made in the course of trade which cause damage.
On 4 March 2013 the European Commission published the results of a study undertaken on the value of Geographical Indication (GI) food products. The results provide some insight into the overall impact of GI products which are considered here from the perspective of the UK.