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Lindt Chocolate Bunny Hops Towards Victory in Trademark Battle

Lindt & Spruengli’s gold foil-wrapped chocolate Easter bunny scored a legal win on Thursday as Germany’s federal court ruled its gold tone had trademark protection. (Lindt & Spruengli)
Lindt & Spruengli’s gold foil-wrapped chocolate Easter bunny scored a legal win on Thursday as Germany’s federal court ruled its gold tone had trademark protection. (Lindt & Spruengli)
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Lindt Chocolate Bunny Hops Towards Victory in Trademark Battle

Lindt & Spruengli’s gold foil-wrapped chocolate Easter bunny scored a legal win on Thursday as Germany’s federal court ruled its gold tone had trademark protection. (Lindt & Spruengli)
Lindt & Spruengli’s gold foil-wrapped chocolate Easter bunny scored a legal win on Thursday as Germany’s federal court ruled its gold tone had trademark protection. (Lindt & Spruengli)

Lindt & Spruengli’s gold foil-wrapped chocolate Easter bunny scored a legal win on Thursday as Germany’s federal court ruled its gold tone had trademark protection.

The Swiss premium chocolate maker has been fighting many court battles over the years to protect one of its best-selling products that, according to the federal court, crossed German counters more than 500 million times in the past 30 years.

After failing to get comprehensive trademark protection for the shape of its sitting bunny, Lindt changed its tactics, trying to protect the shade of the foil instead, a strategy that seems to start bearing fruit.

Germany’s federal court said the tone of the gold foil used to wrap its chocolate bunnies had trademark protection, citing market research presented by the company that showed that 70% of respondents associated the gold tone with the Lindt bunny.

A court in Munich had previously rejected Lindt’s claims against German confiserie Heilemann, owned by Viba Sweets, that also sells a sitting bunny in golden foil. The appeals court will now have to reexamine the case.

Lindt & Spruengli said it did not intend to force another chocolate bunny manufacturer out of the market, but was defending itself against copycats exploiting the reputation it had built for its product over years.

“There are many ways to design Easter bunnies that don’t infringe Lindt & Spruengli’s rights,” said a spokesperson for the company that raised its full-year guidance after reporting strong Easter sales this week.

Viba Sweets was not immediately available to comment.

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Eggs Are Less Likely to Crack When Dropped on Their Side, According to Science

Fresh eggs are delivered along with chickens and a portable chicken coop to a client’s house as part of the "Rent The Chicken" service in La Crescenta, California, on April 21, 2025. (AFP)
Fresh eggs are delivered along with chickens and a portable chicken coop to a client’s house as part of the "Rent The Chicken" service in La Crescenta, California, on April 21, 2025. (AFP)
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Eggs Are Less Likely to Crack When Dropped on Their Side, According to Science

Fresh eggs are delivered along with chickens and a portable chicken coop to a client’s house as part of the "Rent The Chicken" service in La Crescenta, California, on April 21, 2025. (AFP)
Fresh eggs are delivered along with chickens and a portable chicken coop to a client’s house as part of the "Rent The Chicken" service in La Crescenta, California, on April 21, 2025. (AFP)

Eggs are less likely to crack when they fall on their side, according to experiments with over 200 eggs.

What does this mean for the best way to crack an egg for breakfast? Not much, since a break around the middle is the best way to get the golden yolk and runny whites to ooze out.

But scientists said it could help with hard-boiling eggs in a pot: Dropping eggs in horizontally may be less likely to cause a stray crack that can unleash the egg's insides in a puffy, cloudy mess.

It's commonly thought that eggs are strongest at their ends — after all, it's how they're packaged in the carton. The thinking is that the arc-shaped bottom of an egg redirects the force and softens the blow of impact.

But when scientists squeezed eggs in both directions during a compression test, they cracked under the same amount of force.

"The fun started when we thought we would get one result and then we saw another," said Hudson Borja da Rocha with Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who helped run the experiments.

The researchers also ran simulations and dropped eggs horizontally and vertically from three short heights up to 0.4 inches (10 millimeters).

The egg result? The ones dropped horizontally cracked less.

"The common sense is that the egg in the vertical direction is stronger than if you lay the egg down. But they proved that's not the case," said materials scientist Marc Meyers with the University of California, San Diego who was not involved with the new study.

Scientists found that the egg's equator was more flexible and absorbed more of the energy of the fall before cracking. The findings were published Thursday in the journal Communications Physics.

Eggs are also usually nestled top-down into homemade contraptions for egg drop challenges as part of school STEM projects, which partially inspired the new study. It's not yet clear whether the new results will help protect these vulnerable eggs, which are dropped at much loftier heights.

It's a bit counterintuitive that the oblong side of an egg could hold up better against a tumble, said study co-author Tal Cohen with Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Countless broken eggs show "the courage to go and challenge these very common, accepted notions," Cohen said.