The impact of EU food labelling on IP Rights

Introduction

You walk into a supermarket, faced with shelves filled with products that appear increasingly similar. Plant-based alternatives sit alongside traditional products, each competing for your attention. Through carefully chosen names, labels, logos, and product information, companies try to communicate quickly and effectively what their product is and why you should choose it.

For businesses, this is not just a question of marketing creativity, but also of clarity. Consumers need to understand what they are buying at a glance. However, what seems like a straightforward exercise can quickly become a regulatory maze. In the EU, many familiar and intuitive terms are subject to strict legal rules. The objective is not to restrict innovation, but to ensure transparency for consumers while protecting established agricultural sectors.

A well-known example appears in the dairy industry. Under EU law, terms such as “milk”, “cheese”, and “butter” apply only to products of animal origin. This requirement has led producers of plant-based alternatives to develop new naming strategies, even where the intended use and consumer understanding may appear clear. In 2017, the Court of Justice confirmed the position in the TofuTown case, holding that qualifiers such as “soy” or “vegan” do not make the use of dairy terms permissible.

More recently, similar discussions have emerged regarding plant-based meat products. In early March, the EU reached a provisional agreement to clarify the use of meat-related terminology in this area. While the precise outcome is still uncertain, it reflects an ongoing effort to balance innovation and consumer clarity.

The broader trend is clear: in the EU food sector, language is not just a matter of branding. It is a regulated interface between law, innovation, and consumer perception.

Implications for Trademarks

This evolving regulatory framework has direct consequences for trademarks under EU Trade Mark Regulation (EU) 2017/1001, which prohibits the registration of marks that are misleading as to the nature or characteristics of goods. While the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) does not refuse trademarks solely because a term is regulated, it often considers consumer perception of regulated terms when it applies these rules.

For businesses, the challenge often starts at the point of brand creation. A name that feels intuitive and effective from a marketing perspective may not sit comfortably within the legal framework. The dairy sector illustrates this clearly. Because the law legally reserves terms such as “milk”, “cheese”, and “butter”, their use on plant-based products may mislead consumers, and authorities are more likely to refuse or challenge trademarks containing these terms. Not because they are regulated per se, but because of how consumers perceive them in light of the regulatory framework.

In other areas, however, the boundaries are still evolving. In the plant-based meat sector, companies often rely on familiar product descriptions such as “burger” or “sausage” to communicate how their products are intended to be used. For the time being, these types of terms appear to remain acceptable. At the same time, more specific references such as “beef” or “chicken” are increasingly part of the regulatory debate and may in future be subject to stricter limitations. This creates a degree of uncertainty for brand owners. A trademark that is acceptable today may be challenged later as the legal framework or consumer perception evolves, which means that businesses need to take into account not only current practice but also likely future developments.

A similar interplay between marketing and regulation can be seen with terms such as “organic” or “bio”, which are associated with EU Regulation 2018/848 and signal certified characteristics. The EUIPO assesses whether consumers would understand these terms as indicating such regulated characteristics, and trademarks that use them descriptively or in a potentially misleading way are more likely to be refused or invalidated. In contrast, terms like “natural” illustrate a more flexible category. They are not harmonised at the EU level but remain subject to the general prohibition on misleading food information. As a result, such terms may be accepted more easily at the registration stage, while still carrying a degree of legal risk depending on how they are used in practice.

Parallels in Patent Law: from marketing language to technical precision

The challenges businesses face in naming and describing their products may also appear in patent law, but with stricter requirements. While food law and trademark law focus on consumer understanding, patents demand technical clarity. In other words, it is not enough for a term to be intuitive or familiar, a patent claim must clearly define the invention so that a skilled person can understand exactly what is covered.

A useful example is the European Patent Office (EPO) decision T1194/23, which involved the term “natural cocoa products” in the patent claims. In everyday language, “natural” seems clear. However, the Board of Appeal had to determine whether, in the field of cocoa products, the term had a more precise meaning. The decision confirmed that “natural” referred specifically to cocoa that had not undergone alkaline treatment, while other processing steps, such as acid or enzymatic treatment, were not excluded. This shows that even seemingly intuitive terms can have highly specific meanings in a technical context, and assumptions based on common usage can be misleading.

A similar issue arises with expressions such as “derived from”, which are frequently used in alternative protein and food technology patents. While such wording can help communicate the origin of a protein or food ingredient, it may not clearly define the technical boundaries of a claim.

For example, in areas such as cultured meat or lab-grown cocoa, products are no longer directly obtained from animals or plants but produced through controlled processes. This raises the question of whether such products still fall within the scope of “derived from” a particular source. If this is not clearly defined, the scope of the claim may become uncertain.

Another challenge arises in product-by-process situations, where a product is defined by how it is made rather than by its structure or composition. In EPO decision T1065/23, concerning a protein-rich extract derived from peas for use as an alternative to animal proteins, the Board of Appeal acknowledged novelty of the protein-rich product because the extraction process gave it specific properties. It was not convincingly shown that these same properties were present in similar products from the prior art. This illustrates that such claims are only robust where the process results in identifiable product characteristics.

Conclusion

Across EU food law, trademark law, and patent law, the same terms such as “milk”, “organic”, “natural”, or “derived from” are assessed in different ways. Each area applies its own criteria, ranging from consumer perception to technical clarity.

For businesses in the food and drink sector, this means that the choice of wording has legal consequences at several levels. Terms that work well in marketing may not be usable as trademarks. They may not clearly define a patentable invention without careful technical framing. Understanding these distinctions early can help avoid costly challenges and support stronger brand and intellectual property protection.

In practice, it is therefore important to consider these aspects together. When developing brands, it is worth checking at an early stage whether key terms are subject to specific regulatory restrictions. In parallel, trademark strategies should take into account not only current rules. But also ongoing regulatory developments, particularly in fast evolving sectors such as plant-based products. For patent applications, care should be taken to ensure that claim language is supported by clear technical definitions.

Ultimately, in the EU food sector, language is more than a communication tool. It is a strategic aspect that can influence how products are perceived, how brands are protected, and how innovations are claimed. Taking an informed approach to wording can help businesses navigate a complex regulatory landscape while maximising both legal security and market impact.

Written by Emilie Logie

European and Dutch Patent Attorney

PhD in Biomedical Sciences

View expert