Ultimately, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and associates took the mindset of ‘we’re not using it so whatever’ when it came down to NFL quarterback Lamar Jackson challenging the copyright claim of the JR Motorsports No. 8 font used over the past seven seasons.
Jackson filed the challenge last week, claiming that the No. 8 font used by the likes of Earnhardt, Josh Berry and Sammy Smith in recent seasons, created merchandising confusion with the Era 8 apparel line he launched over the past two years.
Keep in mind, this is not the old Dale Earnhardt Inc. No. 8 font that Junior used in his earliest days racing in the Cup Series that stepmother Teresa Earnhardt held the copyright to until relinquishing it over the summer. But Earnhardt applied to acquire that mark but also the one he had been using just in case.
“We learned that the Budweiser No. 8 trademark is not going to be continued and renewed by Teresa,” Earnhardt Jr said on his Dale Jr Download podcast on Tuesday. “We were a bit surprised by that because she kept the one trademark. Haven’t talked to Teresa. Don’t know why that was her decision, but we saw an opportunity to pick up the number and see if we could get the trademark.”
They successfully acquired that mark but was still waiting approval on the longstanding JRM mark when he discovered on social media about the Jackson claim.
“I learned on social media, about the same time that everybody else did, that Lamar was contesting our trademark application,” Earnhardt said. “He wasn’t suing me, he was just contesting it, and there’s a part of trademark process where if you believe somebody’s applying for a trademark and it will hurt your brand, you can oppose it. … When I learned about it, I thought for sure it was over the Bud 8. …
“The next day, actually, we filed the paperwork to abandon the acquisition of that trademark for the JR Motorsports 8. We got what we wanted, and down the road, I was not going to argue with Lamar over something that I didn’t plan on using. I wasn’t going to spend thousands of dollars with my lawyers to fight for something I didn’t need.”
And that was that.
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