Nestle UK tries to trademark the Kit Kat shape-- and fails

Why, Nestle, why?

Why don’t you give us a break?

 Nestle, the maker of the Kit Kat in the UK, failed after trying to trademark the chocolate candy’s four fingered shape to fend off competition from rivals.

 According to CBS, the British High Court ruled that the shape wasn’t distinctive enough to warrant a trademark.

 Judge Richard Arnold stated that the shoppers weren’t likely to confuse Kit Kats with similarly shaped candy, but instead would “rely only on the word mark Kit Kat and the other word and the pictorial marks used in relation to the goods in order to identify the trade origin of the products,” he said. “They associate the shape with Kit Kat (and therefore with Nestlé), but no more than that.”

 The case is part of a long legal battle between Nestle and Cadbury, owned by Mondelez, that wants to produce a similar bar. The two companies have gone to court in London and in the European Court of Justice when Nestle first attempted the trademark in 2010.

 The ruling makes way for Cadbury and other European chocolate makers to produce their own KitKat-like candy bars, although Nestle told CBS MoneyWatch that it plans to appeal the judgment.

 The four finger Kit Kat bars have been made in Britain since 1935. Hershey makes the Kit Kat for the U.S. market.