## Facts

- Sebago Inc. owned shoe trademarks registered in the Benelux, and its exclusive Benelux distributor was Ancienne Maison Dubois & Fils SA.
- GB-Unic SA, a Belgian company, acquired Sebago-branded shoes manufactured in El Salvador and sold them in Belgium.
- The parties did not dispute that the shoes sold by GB-Unic were genuine.
- Sebago and Maison Dubois claimed the shoes sold in Belgium had not been placed on the EEA market with their consent.
- A Belgian appellate court referred questions to the Court of Justice of the European Communities for interpretation of Article 7(1) and 7(2) of Directive 89/104 on trademark exhaustion.

## Issues

1. Whether Article 7(1) of Directive 89/104 allows Member States to recognize exhaustion based on first marketing of trademarked goods outside the EEA.
2. Whether consent to EEA marketing of some units/batches of a product exhausts trademark rights for other units of the same product marketed in the EEA without the proprietor’s consent.

## Decision

- The court held that exhaustion under Article 7(1) occurs only where goods are first put on the market in the EEA by the trademark proprietor or with the proprietor’s consent.
- The court held that Directive 89/104 does not permit Member States to adopt rules providing for exhaustion based on marketing in non-EEA countries.
- The court held that exhaustion is limited to the individual items that were put on the EEA market with the proprietor’s consent; consent for some units does not exhaust rights for other units marketed without consent.
- The matter was returned to the Belgian court to apply this interpretation to the dispute.

## Legal Principles

- Trademark exhaustion under Directive 89/104 is regional: it is triggered only by first marketing in the EEA by, or with the consent of, the trademark proprietor.
- Member States may not implement “international exhaustion” regimes for trademarks within the scope of Directive 89/104.
- Exhaustion is item-specific: it applies only to the particular goods placed on the EEA market with the proprietor’s consent, not to all identical goods or later-imported batches.
- Absent consent for the specific goods at issue, the proprietor may oppose use of the mark for their marketing in the EEA, subject to any separate “legitimate reasons” analysis under Article 7(2).

## Conclusion

The court construed Article 7 of Directive 89/104 to bar international exhaustion and to require unit-specific consent for exhaustion, meaning parallel importers cannot rely on genuine status or prior authorized EEA sales of other batches to defeat trademark control over unauthorized imports from outside the EEA.


Sebago Inc. v. GB-Unic SA, 1999 E.T.M.R. 681 (C.J.E.U. 1999)