France Has ‘Champagne,’ Portugal Has ‘Port.’ Should Australia Have ‘Uggs?’<br />In a letter dated in July, Mr. Turnbull said he had asked the Australian Embassy in Washington to get information from the United States government about the dispute<br />and to “reiterate Australia’s view that ‘ugg’ is a generic term.”<br />The argument may be tough to make in the United States, legal experts say.<br />“If the French can protect ‘Champagne’, the Portuguese ‘Port’, the Spanish ‘Sherry’ and the Greeks ‘Feta’,” said Nick Xenophon, an Australian senator, in a recent statement, alluding to the brand protections<br />that some famous names enjoy, “then surely Australia can protect the word ‘Ugg.’” (Mr. Xenophon on Friday said he would resign as a senator.)<br />Mr. Oygur sold about $2,000 worth of lowercase ugg boots in the United States<br />over a five-year period, his lawyer said, and believed he had every right to.<br />“It only cares about the perception of the relevant consumer population,<br />and in the U. S., the relevant population was not likely and probably still isn’t likely influenced by Australian English.”<br />Uggs — the generic kind — might seem like an odd place for Australia to plant its cultural flag.<br />Though Australian by pedigree, the Uggs brand name in the United States is owned by a company based in California — and<br />that firm is suing an Australian shoemaker for using it.<br />Mr. Carroll, a famous surfer in the 1960s and ’70s, discovered the boots while hitting the waves<br />in Australia, where locals used them to keep their feet warm on cold days at the beach.
