Frozen Karma: The Great Klondike Bar Trademark Battle
The Klondike bar’s catchy slogan isn’t just marketing talk. The ice cream novelty was subject to a legal saga that nearly went to the Supreme Court.
A version of this post originally appeared on Tedium, a twice-weekly newsletter that hunts for the end of the long tail.
What would you do for a Klondike bar?
Most people would probably go to the nearest store, buy a package of chocolate-covered ice cream novelties, and make sure that the package eventually finds an icebox — well, as long as they don’t finish said novelties first.
(That said, “I’m ashamed of what I did for a Klondike bar” makes for a pretty good T-shirt slogan.)
The food conglomerate Kraft was willing to do more than most for a Klondike bar: They saw an opportunity to usurp a rising regional dairy treat with their own version, blatantly ripping it off, causing a listeria outbreak, and finding themselves mired in legal battles, all within the span of a few years.
Let’s discuss the surprising obsession that Klondike bars generate.
