i4F frees industry from “SPC” trademark stronghold

• i4F acquires “SPC” trademark rights
• All current “SPC” trademark US customs actions lifted
• No longer necessary to cover “SPC” name on product packaging on US product imports

TURNHOUT, BELGIUM – i4F®, a group of companies providing patents and technologies to the flooring industry, today announced that it has obtained the full rights to the US “SPC” trademark and, is freeing the flooring industry from current US customs restraints related to SPC products carrying L2C program holographic labels.

Over the past months, the flooring industry faced large scale US customs border seizures and, consequently, was forced into paying large sums to have containers holding their SPC products released.

To liberate the market from these hurdles, i4F filed legal procedures against Kolay Flooring as well as its owner, Dan Mitchell.  As a result of a settlement and follow-up amendments to the existing settlement agreements with SPC flooring technology licensors Unilin and Välinge, all customs actions based on the “SPC” trademark against SPC products carrying an L2C label have stopped.  This also means that it is no longer necessary to cover up the word “SPC” from such products imported into the US. 

The L2C program is an industry authentication labelling program for licensed partners which requires an authorized and unique holographic label on every box of product that is covered by certain intellectual property.

Bill Blackstock, president and CEO of the Resilient Floor Covering Institute (RFCI), commended i4F on its initiative, “On behalf of all RFCI members, we would like to extend our deepest appreciation to i4F for its commitment in supporting the resilient flooring industry and ensuring the term SPC remains available for the entire industry to use to describe its products.” 

i4F CEO, John Rietveldt, adds, “We believe in freedom to operate and accessibility so when we found out the industry was being subjected to, what we fiercely believed to be unjust fees and significant delays at US customs, we didn’t hesitate to take action!  Thankfully, this paid off and has now resulted in a settlement. Manufacturers participating in the L2C program, can now rest assured that their SPC products will not be detained at customs for the use of the SPC name.”