RE: BOC legal action against MGA True Hope dolls
by Beautiful and Bald Barbie! Let's see if we can get it made on ·
It was brought to our attention that Beads of Courage is pursuing MGA with legal action due to the bracelets that are packaged with the dolls. To prevent any suspicion of rumor we are postings couple parts from the legal papers issued by BOC to MGA...

"It has come to BOC's attention that MGA is selling colorful beaded bracelets packaged with hairless dolls under the BRATZ@ TRUE HOPETM line of dolls. The inclusion of colorful beaded bracelets sold with hairless dolls violates BOC's trade dress rights under the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. $ 1125(a), which states that,"any person who... uses in commerce any word, term, name, symbol, or device, or any combination thereof, or any false designation of origin... which is likely to cause confusion... as to the affrliation, connection, or association of such person with another person, or as to the origin, sponsorship, or approval of his or her goods... shall be liable in a civil action." 15 U.S.C. $1125(a). Furthermore, MGA's use of the slogan "Courage is always in style!" in connection with colorful beaded bracelets sold with hairless dolls is evidence of an attempt to create an association between the beads sold with the TRUE HOPETM dolls and BOC."...

"This violation of BOC's trade dress is a serious matter and entitles BOC to damages as provided by 15 USC $1117. Particularly, BOC is entitled to MGA's profits, BOC's damages, and the costs ofpursuing any such action. I 5 USC $1 I I 7(a)."...

"Irrespective of MGA's infringement, BOC is willing to consider an amicable resolution to this dispute. As a starting point, MGA must (1) discontinue the sale or distribution of any hairless dolls (or other dolls meant to denote a sick child) that include beaded jewelry; (2) provide an accounting of all sales of colorful beaded jewelry with hairless dolls; (3) cease any use of any trademarks, domain names, or other identifiers that incorporate the BOC Trademarks or are likely to be confused with the BOC Trademarks; (4) and agree in writing to cease any further use ofjewelry or other identifiers that are likely to be confused with BOC's trade dress."

Our great hope is that greed will stay out of this and we can all continue to help support children living with hair loss due to illnesses or other conditions and that something good would not be tainted into something bad, on any side of this. The first thing on the list from BOC is that MGA must stop selling the True Hope dolls packaged with the bracelets. This would entail removing all True Hope dolls from store shelves and stop online sales. If this were to be allowed to happen it would mean trashing all packaing and starting over new...which would set back the ability for any more children to be able to receive a True hope doll in the near future. It would mean less money coming in to not only City of Hope but to charities in Cananda and the UK which have already been established to receive a portion of proceeds from the sale of True Hope dolls...all because of a name bracelet for the children to wear of receive a True Hope doll.
We encourage anyone who wants to see the end of this legal action please politely to write to
Jean M. Baruch PhD, RN
Executive Director and Founder, Beads of Courage, Inc.
jbaruch@beadsofcourage.org
and you can call
1 (520) 344-7668

Jane Bingham
Founder - The Beautiful and Bald Movement
and
Beautiful and Bald Barbie! Let's see if we can get it made Facebook page

Beckie Bonifassi
Co-Founder - The Beautiful and Bald Movement
and
Beautiful and Bald Barbie! Let's see if we can get it made Facebook page

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Lynn Benefiel, Lia Koletsi, Massachusetts Kids Club and 15 others like this.
24 shares

Laura Emeny-Porter I will politely let them know how unneccessary this is. It upsets me to see that someone always has to sour the pot. Urgh!!!
July 9 at 2:11pm via mobile · Like · 3

Whitney Ryan Smith This is absurd!
July 9 at 2:15pm via mobile · Like · 4

Cathy Cleary Try getting with some of the Veterans non profits who do same thing, mine doesnt (and we are not legally a non profit yet) , but I know a lot do, if I run into one I will send url in message
July 9 at 2:16pm · Like · 1

Brooklyn Bottorff That's stupid, all they care about is money apparently!
July 9 at 2:20pm via mobile · Like · 2

Gino Galella God Bless ♥
July 9 at 2:20pm · Like

Kristin Hovland You've got to be freaking kidding me! Ugh.
July 9 at 2:29pm via mobile · Like

Rae'sin A. Ruckus This breaks my heart... you should create a true hope bracelet, one to put on the doll and one for the child packaged with the doll and tell BOC to go pound sand!!! Then you could sell the bracelets separately as well to help ease the costs encountered by this ridiculous lawsuit.
July 9 at 2:37pm · Like · 5

Kerry Sanderson Will you post if u hear sales have been stopped x
July 9 at 2:37pm via mobile · Like

Brenda Fiedler wow!!!
July 9 at 2:51pm · Like

Shelley Morren You all need to really do some research on this before coming to conclusions.
July 9 at 3:01pm · Like · 3

Beautiful and Bald Barbie! Let's see if we can get it made Shelley this is copied from the actual document so what research is needed.
July 9 at 3:28pm via mobile · Like · 10

Mandi Nicole Neldon From what I am understand about what is written above, the bead company is saying they can sue anyone who uses brightly colored beads on their braclets. This is not right. If the...See More
July 9 at 3:49pm · Like · 6

Megan Matthews Sorry...read what BOC posted!! They want money from the True Hope dolls! All of this because the dolls have bravery bracelets!! No connection in anyway! No research needed... ...See More
July 9 at 4:46pm via mobile · Like · 5

Eddie McCoubrey Of course it's money for BoC, see the price of a bead? That's a lot of cash, no?
July 9 at 4:52pm via mobile · Like · 1

Coby Cook Ok ok. The way I understood it was that they had to cease selling the dolls with the beads. So, can they not just remove the beads from the brats dolls and then come to an agreement on what is owed and then focus on the real matter here: the kids.
July 9 at 6:01pm via mobile · Like · 1

Brenda Fiedler I agree! It is the kids that is what is important here. Is it not what started it all to begin with?!? The bravery and love of the children? Not the love of the money!
July 9 at 6:19pm · Like · 2

JD Douglas I remember seeing colorful beadwork in ancient egyptian paintings.. Seems to me that colorful beads have been around a lot longer than all of us, I don't see how Beads of Courage ...See More
July 9 at 6:35pm · Edited · Like · 4

Larry Emeny unfortunately money is what drives business
July 9 at 6:36pm · Like

JD Douglas Beads of Courage's mascot looks an awful lot like Kellogg's Tony the Tiger and someone said Grrrreeat on the picture.. Maybe Keloggs should be going after them? They should be livi...See More
July 9 at 6:44pm · Edited · Like · 5

Traci Born I make AND SELL colorful beaded bracelets, anklets, necklaces, etc... all the time, sometimes with kids names on them. Does this mean that BOC will come after ME next? This is wrong!
July 9 at 7:09pm · Like · 4

Beautiful and Bald Barbie! Let's see if we can get it made BTW apparently this is not BOC's first cease and desist letter to an organization, found out some information regarding Bravery Beads and Beads of Courage sending them one also. BTW Bravery Beads has been around since 99/2000
July 9 at 7:45pm · Like · 4

Melanie Moreno Traci - if you accidentally mention that are similar or accidentally confuse people whether intentionally or not that are affiliated with Beads of Courage, they yes, they may. It's...See More
July 9 at 10:46pm · Like · 2

Rena Schmidt Thornhill many hospitals have their own version of the beads and sell jewellery to offset these costs...are they looking into sueing them too??? Please leave them alone and let them celebrate being beautiful when you are bald!!
July 10 at 9:54am · Like · 3

Rebecca Brown I can't believe this.
I think it's disgusting that the focus is about money.
Money over supporting children/people across the world?

I don't really know what to say, I'm hurt and ...See More
July 10 at 10:10am · Like · 4

Ruby Ter Horst terrible that BOC is doing this, this does make clear what their foundation is all about, and its not ill people. However, they have no case at all, so please don't settle.
July 10 at 10:37am · Like · 1

Alice Hundt I agree with Rebecca Brown, this is suppose to bring joy to children and show them that there is nothing wrong about how they look like. The focus is not money, it's all about happiness.
July 10 at 11:39am · Like · 1

Dawn Burgess This is just sad. I totally understand where BOC is coming from, but since it doesn't appear at all that there was INTENT to infringe on a copyright, this could be handled in a much more constructive way.
July 10 at 3:46pm · Like · 5

Kevin Burgess Sounds like greed has alread made its way in to this by the filing of the lawsuit. Very sad.
July 10 at 5:13pm via mobile · Like

Debbie Calhoun Ware This is sad and just makes BOC sound like "The Pink Crowd" I don't even like to think of her name. Urgh!
July 11 at 10:24am · Like

Nikki MrsFisher Fisher Greed! When its about the sick children some who are terminal! I dont now how that greed polluted and sick company leaders sleep @ night!!
July 13 at 12:03am via mobile · Like · 1

Twila Cox Put a real rubber bracelet in for the child to wear with a message for the child. Remove the other one and problem solved. And they don't own beads. You can get them in hobby lobby all shapes and sizes...Money is all about greed.
September 15 at 11:53am · Like