An interesting aspect of common law systems is that solicitors will often find that some legal cases will have wide-reaching implications that reach far beyond the individual case.

One of the biggest examples of this is Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball Company, a 1892 legal case that established several fundamental principles of contract law, which continues to affect property sales to this day.

There are a lot of cases that have remarkable implications in the broader world of property law, which range from issues over fox farms to the breakup of the biggest band in the world.

Because of this, an international trademark dispute between the largest fast food chain in Ireland and the largest in the world could have huge implications for UK property law, particularly given a recent legal filing the latter has made in the UK, according to Business Post Ireland.

Mac And Mc

The former is Supermac’s, an Irish fast food chain originally launched in County Galway in 1978, before expanding across Ireland.

The name itself comes from its founder and managing director, Pat McDonagh, who was nicknamed “Supermac” during his time at Carmelite College playing Gaelic football and developing an association with sporting events in Ireland that continues to this day.

By contrast, McDonald’s is one of the largest fast food chains in the world, but actually has fewer retail locations in Ireland than Supermac’s and opened its first Dublin location within months of Supermac’s being founded.

For four decades until 2017, both operated in the country without incident, and this only began to change when Supermac’s began the process of registering its trademarks in the EU in preparation for a European expansion.

This dispute would lead to a legal scuffle that would last nearly a decade.

Mac Vs Mc

McDonald’s complained about the trademark application and alleged an infringement on their Big Mac burger, a popular two-tiered beef burger that has become an informal price index amongst economists.

The dispute would eventually lead to several legal challenges, with Supermac’s claiming that McDonald’s should lose the exclusive rights to the name Big Mac and related marks for any use outside of beef burgers.

McDonald’s, by contrast, argued that Supermac’s, and particularly menu items such as the Mighty Mac, could be confusing to customers and that the Big Mac was a prominent part of their branding even outside of the burger for which it is named, including a limited edition Chicken Big Mac.

Whilst Supermac’s is a major brand in Ireland, it has practically no presence anywhere else, which led to Mr McDonagh describing the legal case as a “David versus Goliath” situation.

In 2019, the EU Intellectual Property Office ruled in their favour, revoking the trademark and briefly allowing Supermac’s to sell food with the Big Mac name, although on appeal, some parts of the McDonald’s Big Mac trademark were returned in 2023.

This was itself appealed by Supermac’s to the European Court of Justice, who in 2024 ruled that outside of its beef burgers, McDonald’s had failed to prove that they had sufficiently used the Big Mac trademark to sell poultry products or services associated with operating restaurants.

This allowed other businesses to use the term “Mac” in business names and chicken products.

McLessons Learned

Ultimately, the Supermac’s v McDonald’s case has highlighted a few general principles of intellectual property law that can extend beyond the confines of trademarks and into broader sectors of property law.

One of the biggest of these is that the law applies to everyone, regardless of wealth, cultural awareness or general size.

A smaller, less financially successful entity can protect its legal and contractual rights if it understands the law and has a legal team that is working with its best interests in mind.

It also illustrated the importance of expedience when it comes to property disputes, intellectual or otherwise.

The Big Mac was made in 1967 and was sold across the United States by the following year. Had McDonald’s filed a trademark lawsuit soon after the launch of Supermac’s, having proved confusion in the marketplace, it is possible that the case could have succeeded, albeit it might have still been controversial.

Instead, the case only being launched four decades later meant that there was proof that the two brands could coexist, something that has also hurt their parallel case in the United Kingdom.

Another interesting aspect is that it highlights the degree to which international legal cases can set precedents in other countries, with Supermac’s legal team arguing that the dismissal of the case in Europe creates a precedent in the UK, given their legal parallels.