Insurer Lemonade embroiled in legal spat with Deutsche Telekom over use of pink

Insurance company Lemonade is embroiled in a legal row with Germany’s Deutsche Telekom (DT) over the use of pink.

DT’s well-known, instantly recognisable logo is largely pink. It has obtained a preliminary injunction instructing Lemonade to remove the colour from all of its German assets. However, the proceedings were ex parte, “meaning that Lemonade has not yet had its day in court”, said Lemonade.

Lemonade is confident of the outcome of the case, pointing to a similar, earlier ‘magenta injunction’, against Swedish telecommunications company Telia. This was overturned by a Danish court, and DT was made to pay costs when it lost at trial.

Lemonade says it has been using pink prominently since its inception in 2015, and its  Instagram campaign, in which hundreds of everyday objects are dunked into pink paint, has been viewed 18 million times in recent months. Lemonade claims that when it comes to insurance, probably no brand in the world is more closely connected with the colour pink than Lemonade. It says that DT, in contrast, is not even licensed to conduct business in “this regulated industry” and therefore the two companies are not competitive in any way.

“In the German telecommunications industry, DT is associated with a particular shade of pink it calls ‘magenta’, though for years it has tried to take a wide range of pinks away from businesses across multiple industries and countries,” said Daniel Schreiber, CEO and cofounder, Lemonade. “DT sought to banish the use of pink from a technology blog in the US, an aspiring watchmaker seeking crowd-funding on Indiegogo, an invoice processor in Holland, a nine-person IT shop in England, and now, it’s claiming it owns pink in the insurance industry, too. If some brainiac at DT had invented the colour, their possessiveness would make sense. Absent that, the company’s actions just smack of corporate bully tactics, where legions of lawyers attempt to hog natural resources – in this case a primary colour - that rightfully belong to everyone.”

In deference to the court, Lemonade temporarily made the colour changes it ordered in Germany. In defiance of DT, Lemonade refused to sign the company’s agreement, choosing instead to challenge its hegemony over pink in all jurisdictions.

Lemonade offers homeowners and renters insurance in the United States, and contents and liability insurance in Germany, through its full-stack insurance carriers. The company says it is “powered by artificial intelligence and behavioural economics”.

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