What is the meaning of 'mootness' as it relates to the affirmative defenses claimed by Clean Your Dirty Face?
Clean_Your_Dirty_Face Franchise · 2025 FDDAnswer from 2025 FDD Document
Make-Up Designory v. Shama Patel, MUD Franchising, LLC and Anjmanj, Inc. (U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, Case No. 1:17-cv-02680, filed April 7, 2017). Make-Up Designory (the "Plaintiff"), an educational institution training student in makeup specialties, filed this lawsuit against the us, our Chief Executive Officer, and Anjmanj, Inc. (collectively the "Defendants") to enforce its intellectual property rights in certain trademarks. Specifically, plaintiff alleged that Defendants were copying and infringing aspects of Plaintiff's intellectual property, and, as a result, creating a likelihood of confusion, actual confusion, and deception as to the affiliation, connection, association, origin, sponsorship and approval of Defendant's services. Plaintiff asserted claims for federal trademark infringement, federal unfair competition, state deceptive trade practices, common law trademark infringement, and common law unfair competition. The relief sought included a judgment stating Defendants infringed Plaintiff's trademark, engaged in unfair competition, engaged in deceptive trade practices, an order transferring ownership of the domain name mudfacialbar.com, money damages, and attorney fees. On May 30, 2017, Defendants filed their answer to the complaint and affirmative defenses claiming failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted; that the claims were based on the doctrines of mootness, estoppel and laches; and that the claims were barred by Plaintiff's failure to mitigate damages. On June 29, 2017, the parties filed a Joint Stipulation of Dismissal with Prejudice and Defendants filed an express abandonment of the "MUD" trademark application on July 5, 2017.
Source: Item 3 — LITIGATION (FDD page 10)
What This Means (2025 FDD)
According to the 2025 Clean Your Dirty Face Franchise Disclosure Document, the term 'mootness' is referenced in the context of a past legal dispute. Specifically, it relates to affirmative defenses that Clean Your Dirty Face and related parties raised in response to a trademark infringement lawsuit filed by Make-Up Designory in 2017.
In this legal context, 'mootness' suggests that the issues raised in the lawsuit had become irrelevant or academic by the time the case was being decided. This can occur if the circumstances that initially gave rise to the dispute have changed, thus eliminating the need for a court to provide a resolution. Other affirmative defenses claimed by Clean Your Dirty Face included estoppel, laches, and failure to mitigate damages.
Ultimately, the parties in the lawsuit filed a Joint Stipulation of Dismissal with Prejudice, and Clean Your Dirty Face abandoned the "MUD" trademark application. This resolution suggests that the initial concerns were addressed, possibly rendering the original claims moot. For a prospective franchisee, this litigation history indicates that Clean Your Dirty Face has faced intellectual property challenges in the past, but the matter was resolved through dismissal and abandonment of a trademark application.