Ritter Sport, the manufacturer of square chocolate products, is currently in dispute with Wacker, the manufacturer of square oat bars. The shape of the square oat bars is based on the square city of Mannheim, which is notable for the block-like design of its residential areas. The square oat bars are advertised on the packaging with the slogan “MONNEMer Quadrat Bio” (MONNEM square organic). However, this designation and the corresponding packaging are not well received by the significantly larger and better-known chocolate manufacturer Ritter Sport. In the summer, Ritter Sport therefore filed a lawsuit for an injunction. The plaintiff is Ritter Schönbuch Vermögensverwaltungs GmbH & Co. KG. The company has filed numerous trademark applications with the German Patent and Trademark Office, including for various designs of packaging (DE 395257891; DE 2910122; DE 398699704).

The resulting attention, which was also fueled by numerous press reports, has probably led to a significant increase in awareness of the Wacker brand. Even though Wacker claims to have scaled back production, this is still a marketing coup for the company. On TikTok, numerous posts by Matteo Wacker (@matteo.wacker) have received hundreds of thousands of views. One of the most successful videos, with over 1.2 million views, plays on the image of the small, family-run company versus the large industrial corporation. It is interesting to note that many of the videos dealing with the dispute between Wacker and Ritter Sport receive significantly more views than comparable videos on other topics from the same account. On TikTok alone, the account appears to have reached over three million views on the topic. It can be assumed that Wacker has gained an image boost in any case, even if the legal dispute against Ritter Sport is lost.