Lawsuit Thought for the Day: Can you Dilute a Brand that’s Barely Recognizable?

August 26th, 2014. By LucyC

It may not be quite the same as your garden variety unpaid wages and misclassification employment lawsuit (read just about any national retailer), but top model Ginta Lapina is alleging she was duped into accepting $19,700 for a day’s shoot in Paris, when she was actually due six or seven figures, in a lawsuit she filed against her agency Women Management. Apparently even the definition of minimum wage is now subjective…

Ginta who? What? You’ve never heard of her?

Well, the 25-year old Latvian supermodel was in Paris for a shoot with Karl Lagerfeld (at least we all know who he is!)—the results of which were used in an international ad campaign for Schwarzkopf hair products. According to the lawsuit, “The Schwarzkopf Look 2014 Trends advertorial was NOT [billed as] an advertising campaign, and therefore, the models were compensated only for their time for the photo shoot but not for the usage of their image.” Ah— there’s the rub.

According to her lawsuit, Lapina was told the use of the Lagerfeld photos would be “narrow in scope” when they were actually used to market Schwarzkopf hair products worldwide.

Lapina, who claims in her suit that she is ranked 27th in model earnings worldwide by the industry site Models.com, states that “The Schwarzkopf products and look of advertisement are not of the caliber normally endorsed by a model of . . . Ginta’s stature in the industry and have diluted her ‘brand’ as a model for the haute couture and/or highest paying clients.”

Contractual gobbledygook aside, “diluted her brand”??? Don’t you have to be able to recognize a brand first before you can tell whether it’s been diluted? Let’s take some bets here—if Lapina were on the cover of a popular beauty magazine, would 90% of the world’s population be able to name her? Uhh…no. Giselle Bundchen, Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell or even Linda Evangelista she’s not. And there’s a good chance that 90% of haute couture clientele would not base their haute couture purchases on whether Lapina strutted the stuff down the runway or a Lapina knock-off did. Just sayin’.

So let’s keep this baby to the issue of commercial usage rights, ok? (And c’mon, one has to wonder if—while the Schwarzkopf ads were not her “caliber”—would they have been if there’d been a six- or seven-figure payday attached to that print run? I’m guessing that might have improved her perspective.)

Just for good measure, perhaps, Lapina is also seeking a court order preventing Schwarzkopf from using her photos.

Needless to say, Women Management said in a statement that it is “surprised and disappointed” by the suit. How unusual. I have yet to read about an employment lawsuit where the employer is not surprised and disappointed…

The agency has, predictably, denied all the allegations saying it will seek all “appropriate remedies.” Not really sure what that would entail. It states that it has managed Lapina since 2008, when she appeared at the New York Fashion Show, and that just last year, she agreed to renew an exclusive management contract through January 2016. Lapina’s resume includes campaigns for Yves Saint Laurent and DKNY.

Oh, it’s rough at the top…I suppose that’s some consolation for those of us slogging away at lesser endeavors.

Tags: Ginta Lapina, Karl Lagerfeld, Schwarzkopf Hair, Totally Tortelicous

This was posted on Tuesday, August 26th, 2014 at 5:09 pm and is filed under Emerging Issues, Totally Tortelicious . Feel free to respond, or trackback. Read our comments policy.