FAME APPEAL

While shopping at a Zara store in SoHo, to my surprise I found a  Michael Jackson t-shirt displayed for sale. All of sudden “Smooth  Criminal and Beat It” flash backs entered my consciousness.  At the bottom of the t-shirt it states. “Copyright Triumph International Inc, under license to Bravado Merchandising. All Right reserved.” It looks like Triumph International Inc. owns the copyright to Michael Jackson’s name. This means that most of the time whenever the King of Pop’s name is used in commerce permission from Triumph International is needed. Triumph International Inc. owns trademark. After searching the web I found out that Michael Jackson made a new company before he died called MJJ Kingdom; MJJ Kingdom gave Triumph International sole rights to sell licenses to companies to MJ’s name. In the case of Zara, Bravado Merchandising purchased a license to make the t-shirt. Therefore if you look at the tag of the t-shirt it says “Michael Jackson for Zara” and then the Bravado logo is properly displayed since they bought the license to use the name. In addition, MJJ Production which I assume owns principal rights to the Michael Jackson name and image, is included on the tag through his “Official” logo of the dancing feet.

I wonder why Zara is even selling Michael Jackson merchandise? Maybe their fashion house helped designed the clothing and simply used the King of Pop to attract a new demographic in their stores. Over the years I have noticed that Zara has lowered its quality of clothes but to sell a pink and silver glitter Michael Jackson t-shirt was going too far. Though it may be a style faux pas, it is an entertainment and fashion business deal dream come true.As far as Zara is concerned, paying royalties to Bravado Merchandising on these sales is great as long as customers keep on pulling MJ t-shirt’s “off the wall!”