L.L. Bean is suing a company that makes customized promotional products for selling bags that it says are too similar to Bean’s own iconic canvas totes.
In documents filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Portland, the Freeport-based retailer said 4Imprint’s “Boat Tote” heavy canvas bags are “confusingly similar” to L.L Bean’s trademarked two-color canvas “Boat and Tote” bags, the Portland Press Herald reported.
L.L. Bean’s now-iconic white canvas bags started in 1944 as Bean’s Ice Carrier, a utility bag for carrying ice blocks that were used in freezers at the time. The bag disappeared from catalogs after a single season but was reintroduced in 1965 in its current two-tone nautical style.
The description of the bag on L.L. Bean’s website begins, “There’s only one Boat and Tote – ours.”