Easygroup Ltd v Jaybank Leisure Ltd

Hearing dates: 9 and 10 October 2025

Approved Judgment

This judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on [date] by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives.

HIS HONOUR JUDGE Hacon

Introduction

This action is one of a succession of proceedings brought by the claimant (‘easyGroup’) to enforce rights in one or more of its trade names, each of which consists of the word ‘easy’ followed by a word suggesting a field of commerce. The earliest and best known is easyJet. The airline business trading under that name was founded by Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou in 1995.

easyGroup was incorporated in 2000 to be the owner and licensor of all intellectual property rights relating to the various ‘easy’ businesses set up by Sir Stelios. Since 2015 easyGroup has brought 52 ‘easy’ trade mark and passing off proceedings. Some have been successful, some not.

The defendant (‘Jaybank’) is a company which for about two years has provided an online vehicle rental and sales business conducted under the trading name EASIHIRE.

easyGroup owns UK registered trade mark no. UK00002349891. It is a series mark on the UK register since 30 November 2007 in this form:

The mark is registered for goods and services in four classes. easyGroup relied only on class 39 in respect of the following services:

‘Rental and hire of… motorised vehicles, non-motorised vehicles… and means of transport; advisory and information services relating to the aforesaid services; information services relating to transportation services, including information services provided on-line from a computer database or the Internet’

The first mark in the series, shown above as the upper mark, includes this description/limitation: ‘The applicant claims the colours orange and white as an element of the first mark in the series.’ This mark was referred to in argument as ‘the orange mark’. There is no stated limitation for the other mark, referred to at the trial as ‘the black and white mark’. The orange mark was not directly in issue but was relied on by Jaybank to infer a limitation in the scope of the black and white mark, an argument I will return to. Hereafter ‘the Trade Mark’ should be taken to mean just the black and white mark.

easyGroup alleges that Jaybank has infringed the Trade Mark pursuant to s.10(2) of the Trade Marks Act 1994 (‘the 1994 Act’) by conducting rental and sales services for vehicles under the sign EASIHIRE. Jaybank denies infringement and relies on a defence of non-use of the Trade Mark on the part of easyGroup, pursuant to s.11A of the 1994 Act. There is no counterclaim.

Stephanie Wickenden appeared for easyGroup, Heather Lawrence for Jaybank.

The witnesses

The witnesses for easyGroup were Anthony Anderson and Simon O'Flynn. Mr Anderson is a former marketing director of easyGroup, later easyGroup and then easyCafe. He is now a self-employed consultant. Mr Anderson gave evidence about the history and operation of easyGroup and other companies within the group. He has given evidence for easyGroup before. I was taken to a judgment in which he was criticised, with his objectivity and reliability being put in doubt. In at least one other judgment this criticism was referred to and apparently endorsed. Undeterred, easyGroup was content to rely on Mr Anderson again in this litigation. I bear in mind what has been said, but based solely on Mr Anderson's written and oral evidence in this case I take the view that while he occasionally veered into giving opinion evidence for which there was no permission, otherwise was doing his best to assist the court and at trial he sought to give honest answers to the questions put to him.

Mr O'Flynn is the Chief Marketing Officer of easyCar Online Ltd and gave evidence about the operation of the easyCar and easyHire businesses. There was rightly no criticism of the way in which Mr O'Flynn gave his evidence.

Jaybank's witnesses were Nicholas Hanley and Mark Richardson. Mr Richardson is a consultant solicitor with the firm instructed by Jaybank. He gave very brief evidence about the repeat of a Google search done on behalf of easyGroup conducted by Mr Anderson.

Mr Hanley is the Managing Director of Jaybank. He discussed the operation of Jaybank and in particular its Easihire and Easirent businesses. Mr Hanley was a good witness who gave clear answers to all the questions put to him.

Other litigation

This action is chronologically the third of four brought by easyGroup and its corporate predecessor against Mr Hanley and/or his companies. The first was concluded by an agreement dated 6 November 2003 (‘the 2003 Settlement Agreement’). Jaybank had not at that time yet been incorporated. The 2003 Settlement Agreement includes these terms:

‘3.1 Subject to Clause 4 and with effect from the Effective Date, the Easirent Companies and the Hanleys shall discontinue and not thereafter recommence use of:

…

3.2.3 use the colour orange as represented by pantone 021C or anything confusingly similar thereto, or the combination of the said colour and white as part of its get-up or trade dress;

3.2A use the Cooper Black Font or any other font which is confusingly similar thereto; and

3.2.5 not in the future register or allow to be registered on their behalf any internet domain name or other trading name containing the words EZY; EZ or EASY or anything confusingly similar thereto.’

Clause 4 provides a carve out from clause 3 and specifies acts that Mr Hanley and his companies can do, including using the EASIRENT sign.

A second action was launched by easyGroup in 2019 against Mr Hanley and others for alleged trade mark infringement and passing off by using EASIRENT. The second action was discontinued in 2019 with a declaration by consent of non-infringement and no passing off on the part of the defendants, together with a payment of £125,000 to some of the defendants.

The fourth action was started in April 2024, in which easyGroup alleges that Mr Hanley has acted in breach of the 2003 Settlement Agreement. Judgment in that action has not yet been given.

Jaybank submitted that the 2003 Settlement Agreement shows that the EASI prefix in a compound word cannot be protected. It certainly does not do so directly. The 2003 Settlement Agreement seems to have created rights as between two of Mr Hanley's companies (not including Jaybank) and easyGroup. Whether it had further impact either in law or as a matter of practical effect is not something to be resolved in this judgment. No defence by reason of a licence under the Agreement was pleaded and I reject the brief suggestion in Jaybank's skeleton argument that there is a licence. None was established.

easyGroup's branding

The terms of the 2003 Settlement Agreement reflect the strict branding requirements imposed on all licensees of easyGroup's trade marks. There was in evidence a document setting out the history of the ‘easy’ brand called ‘The easy family of brands photo album’, 6 ^th ed.. It includes brand guidelines which Mr Anderson described as ‘prescriptive’. I take this to mean that all easyGroup's licensees are required to comply with the guidelines. There is apparently a brand manual issued to licensees. It was not in evidence but I assume that its contents are consistent with what is said in the album. No doubt Mr Anderson would have mentioned any inconsistency.

Under a heading ‘Key elements of the easy logo and design’ the album identifies what are described as the ‘key aspects of the easy visual identity’. They are first, use of the Cooper Black font. The album says:

‘Renowned branding expert Sarah Hyndman in her book “Why fonts matter” published in 2016 states: “When I see Cooper Black I think of the easyJet logo”’

It seems that the font was selected by Sir Stelios, presumably in the early days of easyJet, because it is ‘particularly distinctive in comparison with other airlines' choice of fonts’. The album continues: ‘Stelios wanted a font that would be distinctive in black and white as well as colour because he wanted to advertise the easy family of brands in newspapers which were predominantly printed in black and white.’

This last point about newspapers was raised with Mr Anderson. It was put to him that newspapers are now largely printed in colour so the need to present the brands in black and white was less of a problem. Mr Anderson did not disagree but said that newspapers are a shadow of their former selves and that the world has moved on. He referred to the rise of the internet. I understand him to have meant that much of easyGroup's advertising is now done using online media, presumably in colour.

The colour in question is orange pantone 021C. Where the brands are presented in colour, which often they are, that precise colour must be used. This is the second key aspect of the ‘easy’ visual identity noted in the album.

The third is that the compound words used for ‘easy’ brands should first have ‘easy’ entirely in lower case followed by the ‘suffix’ – a word which connotes a field of commerce – which must have its first letter in upper case, so easyJet, easyHire and so on.

The ‘easy’ brand guidelines set out in the album contain a long list of ways in which a brand might be presented in ways that slightly differ from the prescribed way, such as the use of shadowing or a hyphen, all of which...