In a European union case ruling, McDonald’s Corp has lost its rights to the trademark “Big Mac” in favor of the Ireland-based fast-food chain Supermac’s.
Supermac said it had never had a product called “Big Mac,” suggesting McDonald’s had used the similarity of the two names to block the Irish chain’s expansion.
Supermac’s, revoked McDonald’s registration of the trademark, saying that the world’s largest fast-food chain had not proven genuine use of it over the five years prior to the case being lodged in 2017. The ruling allows other companies as well as McDonald’s to use the “Big Mac” name in the EU.
Supermac was founded by Pat McDonagh who earned the nickname Supermac as an Irish teenager in the late 1960s when he guided his school to a football victory over St. Gerald’s, a more fancied team. He opened the first Supermac in Ballinasloe, a town in county Galway, in 1978. The company now has 106 outlets across Ireland and Northern Ireland.