Tired Hands – A Farewell To FarmHands On 9/26

We brought you this story earlier today…and now this update from Tired  Hands:

A few months ago, we received a Cease & Desist notice from lawyers representing Brewery Vivant from Grand Rapids, Michigan over our use of the name FarmHands (one word, plural), because they brew a beer called Farm Hand (two words, non-pluralized). The C&D stipulated that we were to no longer use the name FarmHands, or we would be sued for millions of dollars.

Generally speaking, Saison is a style of beer with roots firmly planted in the fields of Northern France and Belgium, a beer which was primarily brewed and consumed by… you guessed it, Farmhands.  That’s why the name is so intuitive (not to mention beautifully in line with our identity as a small business: Tired Hands, HopHands, FarmHands… you get the picture).  Go ahead, search for “farm hand” on Ratebeer.com. No less than three other breweries are currently using some combination of those two words to identify one of their beers… Some even distribute in America.  As educated beer consumers, you would not have any trouble distinguishing one beer from another (not to mention the fact that none of these beers are available in the same geographic location).  Marketplace confusion sucks, but we have never had that problem in our industry, because what we sell is necessarily unique to the producer.  We’re not making widgets here, we are crafting an organic product that has inherent value beyond “branding.”

As an industry, we are heading down a gnarled and paranoiac path that will only serve to isolate our customers by truncating the creativity of fellow beer producers; effectively losing sight of what made this industry so great when I entered into it nearly a decade ago… Collaboration, camaraderie, and a sense of infinite exploration.

We have had an absolutely killer first year of business, and are deeply thankful to all of you who have helped make Tired Hands what it is today. That being said, our money is better spent paying our employees (20 and counting!) and brewing killer beer. That’s not to say that we didn’t spend any cash on this engagement; we spent almost $5,000 on defending our FarmHands. We exist for one very simple reason; to produce the best beer in the area. Localization still guides all that we do, which is why we are continuing to invest in our community via the construction of a new production brewery that will (hopefully) meet the local demand for our strange and beautiful beers of distinction and valor.