“Taco Tuesday,” the everyman’s term for the day of the week set aside to eat the popular dish, now belongs to most everyone.
Taco John’s, the Cheyenne, Wyo.-based restaurant chain that trademarked the term decades ago, is abandoning the legal status — on a Tuesday, no less — to end a potentially expensive battle with Taco Bell.
“We’ve always prided ourselves on being the home of Taco Tuesday, but paying millions of dollars to lawyers to defend our mark just doesn’t feel like the right thing to do,” Taco John’s CEO Jim Creel said in a statement. “We’re lovers, not fighters.”
Taco John’s, with nearly 400 restaurants in 23 states, has owned the trademark on “Taco Tuesday” since 1989 in every state except New Jersey, where Gregory’s Restaurant & Bar in Somers Point owns it. Taco John’s used to send cease-and-desist letters to restaurants that used the phrase.
Taco Bell, owned by fast food giant Yum! Brands (ticker: YUM), filed a petition in May with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office trying to cancel the trademark, saying that “Taco Tuesday” is generic and that any restaurant that makes tacos should be able to use it.
Taco Bell even enlisted NBA star LeBron James for an advertisement calling for the liberation of Taco Tuesday. Nearly 25,000 people signed its Change.org petition to “free Taco Tuesday.”
The two restaurant chains were gearing up for a showdown when Taco John’s decided to call it quits, clearing the way for any restaurant outside New Jersey to use it. Instead, Taco John’s is challenging Taco Bell to another battle.
It plans to donate $40,000, or $100 for each of its restaurants, to Children of Restaurant Employees, a national nonprofit group that supports restaurant industry employees with children who are battling a health crisis, death, or natural disaster.
“We’re challenging our litigious competitors and other taco-loving brands to join us in supporting the people who serve our favorite food to guests across the nation,” by taking up its $100-per-restaurant pledge, Creel said. “Let’s see if our friends at Taco Bell are willing to ‘liberate’ themselves from their army of lawyers by giving back to restaurant families instead,” estimating that would amount to a $720,000 donation.
Taco Bell could not immediately be reached for comment.
Taco John’s has challenged Del Taco, Taco Bueno, Taco Cabana,
Jack in the Box
(JACK), and mom-and-pop taco shops that promote Taco Tuesday to donate, too, and encouraged James to donate whatever he earned from Taco Bell’s Taco Tuesday promotion to the cause.
Gregory’s Bar says on its website that it served its first tacos on a Tuesday night in 1979 and that it got the trademark for TacoTuesday in 1982.
Write to Janet H. Cho at janet.cho@dowjones.com
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