During IP litigation, you may be confronted with a consumer survey that, on its face, appears persuasive and well-executed. Take advantage of rebuttal surveys and critiques from the experts at Keegan & Donato Consulting to highlight potentially pivotal flaws in the survey evidence you face.
The vast experience of Keegan & Donato Consulting includes conducting consumer surveys to test a wide variety of Lanham Act claims, such as likelihood of confusion, strength of mark, secondary meaning, acquired distinctiveness, trade dress, and others, false and deceptive advertising, consumer perception, and expert witness testimony on consumer survey, marketing and economic issues.
Principals Mark Keegan and Tony Donato offer more than 30 years of combined experience and education in consumer-based survey research and data analysis in the context of intellectual property disputes, and follow a solid methodological foundation in survey design, execution and presentation.
Finding Survey Flaws & How They Might Help Your Case
Surveys can provide powerful and valid evidence, but an overly broad survey that fails to address the key issues in a case, even if based on an accepted methodology, may be deemed inadmissible or given little weight by the Court.
For example, in Kate Spade LLC v. Saturdays Surf LLC, 950 F.Supp. 2d 639 (Dist. Court, S.D. New York 2013), the Court found consumer survey testimony presented by both parties to be of limited value and afforded the surveys no weight. Saturdays Surf LLC’s survey was determined to suffer from methodological flaws that raised “serious questions about the leading nature of the survey design.” Kate Spade LLC’s survey was also found to be poorly designed.
In Water Pik, Inc. v. Med-Systems, Inc., 726 F.3d 1142, 1144-50 (10th Cir. 2013), there is a lengthy discussion about why the Court determined that survey evidence submitted by the defendant in this trademark infringement and unfair competition case, “had too many methodological flaws to be of any probative value.”
With an unparalleled knowledge of the science and methodology behind consumer research surveys, Keegan & Donato Consulting has the ability to identify survey weaknesses that may not be obvious to an untrained eye, but may help you refute the credibility of an opposing expert’s work.
In addition to survey rebuttal, we are often enlisted for advice on how to approach an opposing expert’s deposition. We can counsel you on specific survey-related issues to address with the expert and on areas of questioning about survey research in general.
Keegan & Donato Consulting has partnered with leading firms across the nation, including Blood Hurst & O’Reardon LLP (San Diego), Ropes & Gray LLP (Washington, DC), SmithAmundsen LLC (Chicago), and Notaro, Michalos & Zaccaria PC (New Jersey), on litigation surveys that have been accepted as evidence in matters involving a broad range of products and services.
When you need rebuttal surveys or critiques to highlight pivotal survey flaws that may help your case, consider Keegan & Donato Consulting. Get in touch with us today at (914) 967-9421 to learn more about our approach and our affordable services.