Iceland vs Iceland: a supermarket and the country battle over the name

Discussions about the trademark dispute have been decidedly frosty.

It's Iceland the supermarket vs Iceland the country, in a trademark dispute. Source: Getty Images

A legal battle has broken out between the country of Iceland and a UK supermarket chain over the trademark of the name Iceland.

Iceland Foods, which owns almost 900 stories in the UK, Ireland, Czech Republic and Iceland (the country) and specialises in frozen food, was granted the EU-wide trademark successfully in late 2014.

Now the country has launched legal action against the chain, claiming it prevents the nation's businesses from describing their products as Icelandic, the BBC reports.

Iceland Foods had "aggressively pursued and won multiple cases against Icelandic companies which use 'Iceland' in their representation or as part of their trademark, even in cases when the products and service do not compete," Iceland's ministry for foreign affairs said in a statement.

The supermarket sent a delegation to Iceland's capital city Reykjavik on Friday to try to reach an agreement in the dispute, but negotiations were decidedly frosty.

"[The talks] got nowhere because it rapidly became clear that the Icelandic authorities have no interest in reaching a compromise," founder and chief executive Malcolm Walker told the BBC.

"We have no real idea why this has suddenly become such a major problem for Iceland (the country).

"Iceland Foods had Icelandic majority shareholders and Icelandic representatives on its board for seven years to 2012. At no point in all those years did any representative of Iceland (the country) raise the slightest concern about our company's branding," he said.

The company did acknowledge that it had blocked an attempt to register "Inspired by Iceland", but did not realise it had come from the Icelandic government.

Iceland's foreign ministry said given the country's refusal to give up control of the word Iceland, it would pursue legal action. 

"The registration of a country name that enjoys highly positive national branding to a private company defies logic and is untenable," the ministry said.

Mr Walker seems to be able to see the funny side of the dispute.

But we're not sure the government of Iceland is laughing.