What Do Pastel Ice Cream Pints Cost? $23.8 Million in Borrowed Branding: Van Leeuwen v. Rebel Creamery

In Van Leeuwen Ice Cream LLC v. Rebel Creamery LLC, No. 21-CV-2356 (E.D.N.Y. July 16, 2026), Judge Eric Komitee ordered Rebel Creamery to disgorge $23.785 million in profits, permanently barred sales of its infringing packaging, and required a complete redesign after finding that Rebel’s founders “clearly fabricated” their story of independent creation. For brand owners, the decision shows that trade dress can be a powerful, enforceable asset. For competitors that draw “inspiration” too freely, it is a warning.

The full memorandum and order are available here.

Inside the Court’s Trade Dress Ruling

Van Leeuwen sued Rebel in April 2021, asserting trade dress infringement and unfair competition under § 43(a) of the Lanham Act, reverse confusion, common-law trade dress infringement, and dilution under N.Y. GBL § 360-l. The trade dress at issue included four elements:

1. Pastel colors.

2. Monochromatic pint-to-lid design.

3. Black script logo with an extended initial letter.

4. Minimalism. 

Rebel deployed all four elements of the Van Leeuwen trade dress, creating a strikingly similar overall impression.

The plaintiff, Van Leeuwen, introduced its redesigned packaging bearing the asserted trade dress in 2016. The redesign more than doubled Van Leeuwen’s average annual growth rate. Shortly thereafter, Rebel launched in 2017 the allegedly infringing trade dress, which the court found had a “near-identical color scheme and script,” distinguishable only by keto dietary information.

After a bench trial, Judge Komitee held that Van Leeuwen’s trade dress was inherently distinctive (arbitrary) because it “selected the elements in question from an unbounded universe of options.” The court rejected Rebel’s functionality defense, noting that pastels need not signal flavor and most brands communicate effectively without minimalism. Under the Polaroid factors¹, the court found that every relevant factor favored Van Leeuwen, including actual confusion: survey evidence showed a 34.3% net confusion rate, and anecdotal accounts described consumers and grocery store employees intermingling the brands.

The bad-faith factor was also significant. The court concluded that the Archibalds (Austin and Courtney Archibald, the husband-and-wife founders of Rebel Creamery) “clearly fabricated” their testimony, calling the probability of all the shared design features “converging at random” to be “infinitesimal.” Rebel produced no sketches, mockups, or earlier drafts. A Wegmans buyer warned the founders about the similarity before Rebel’s first retail launch, but they made no changes.

The court imposed a permanent injunction and awarded $23.785 million in disgorged profits, reducing Van Leeuwen’s $36.4 million request by 33% to reflect some consumer demand attributable to Rebel’s keto positioning rather than its packaging.

From Judgment to Chapter 11

On August 14, Rebel filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the District of Utah, reporting $13.78 million in assets and $23.85 million in liabilities. Rebel listed Van Leeuwen as the largest unsecured creditor, with a $23.785 million claim marked “disputed” pending appeal. Rebel filed its notice of appeal on August 12, two days before the bankruptcy petition.

The automatic stay under 11 U.S.C. § 362 halts collection on the monetary judgment. But the permanent injunction requiring a packaging redesign may survive because courts have held that intellectual property injunctions can fall outside the stay. Whether Rebel must complete the redesign while the appeal and bankruptcy are pending will likely be litigated. 

What This Means for Competitive Branding and Shelf Strategy

By deploying all four trade dress elements, Rebel created an association with Van Leeuwen among consumers and retailers. The decision underscores the risk of borrowing a competitor’s established visual language and goodwill.

Shelf placement evidence was important. For example, the court credited a market study finding that retailers “increasingly place Rebel with super-premium brands” and that its “packaging resembles super-premium brands rather than better-for-you (“BFY”) ice cream brands.” One buyer indicated that consumers would look at Rebel and think, “Hey. Is this Van Leeuwen out of Brooklyn that’s just fantastic dairy-milk ice cream?”

For consumer products clients: Packaging is a branding decision, and borrowing a competitor’s established look can create Lanham Act liability. Obtain a trade dress clearance opinion before any redesign that approaches a competitor’s look.

Failing to do so can, for better or worse, result in a “bet the company” type of case for an infringer.

Court finds ice cream brand’s look-alike packaging was “clearly fabricated,” awards competitor $23.8 million in profits.

[1] (1) Strength of the trade[dress]; (2) similarity of the [trade dress]; (3) proximity of the products and their competitiveness with one another; (4) evidence that the senior user may ‘bridge the gap’ by developing a product for sale in the market of the alleged infringer’s product; (5) evidence of actual consumer confusion; (6) evidence that the imitative [trade dress] was adopted in bad faith; (7) respective quality of the products; and (8) sophistication of consumers in the relevant market.