Ugg Owner v Quince: 5 Takeaways for Brands Battling Dupes

On June 16, a federal jury in California ruled that Quince’s Australian Shearling Mini Boot infringed US design patent D927,161 covering the UGG Classic Ultra Mini boot.

But here’s the snag for Deckers and other established fashion brands.

Despite finding that Quince copied the design, the jury concluded that Deckers’ patent was invalid, agreeing with Quince’s arguments that it was “functional, indefinite and obvious in light of prior art”.

Because the patent was ruled invalid, the jury awarded no damages and imposed no liability on Quince, handing the e-commerce company the overall victory.

The result means that, in the same litigation, Deckers failed to secure protection under either trade dress or design patent law—an outcome likely to reverberate well beyond the footwear sector.

As the dust settles on one of the first major dupe cases to reach trial, here are five key takeaways for brand owners grappling with the growing popularity of copycat goods.

1. A win for dupes, a warning for brands

There is no disputing that the outcome represents a significant win for businesses built around offering affordable alternatives to prestige products. Having successfully defeated both Deckers’ trade dress and design patent claims, Quince emerged with a roadmap that other dupe sellers will study closely.

Willie Stroever, member of Cole Schotz, believes the case is set to become a key authority cited by alleged dupe sellers when defending infringement claims and challenging the validity of design rights.

“What changes is that now people have something concrete to argue against—dupers will say, ‘this is just like that case’, and brand owners will say, ‘it’s different because we have X, Y, Z’. We’ll definitely see this case cited often,” he says.

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