THE FASHION LAW
image: Chanel
An “insane number of flowers," as InStyle put it recently, go into each and every bottle of Chanel No. 5, the world-famous fragrance that the Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, the founder of Chanel, created and released in the early 1920’s with the help of master perfumer, Ernest Beaux. There is more that goes into the making – and maintaining – of the house’s collection of perfumes than their precious ingredients of Pégomas jasmine flowers and Pégomas roses, though.
With that in mind, it should come as little surprise that the Paris-based design house has faced no shortage of trademark squabbles over names (Jersey, for instance) and numbers (No. 5, of course) in connection with its fragrances and battles to protect the valuable land upon which it harvests the 1,000+ individual flowers that go into each bottle of Chanel No. 5.
The most momentous legal scuffle to date, however, took place almost a century ago.
The battle over the rights to Chanel No. 5 dates back to 1924 when Ms. Chanel, herself, joined with French businessmen Pierre and Paul Wertheimer to expand the distribution of her fragrance, which, at the time, was only available to clients who visited her Parisian atelier. Alongside the Wertheimers, Coco Chanel created a corporate entity, "Les Parfums Chanel,” and together, they embarked upon an effort to expand the reach of the perfume beyond France’s borders.
Théophile Bader, the founder of Galeries Lafayette, had introduced the parties; in exchange, he gained 20 percent of the venture and a promise that Galeries Lafayette would be the first-ever department store to offer the exclusive fragrance. 70 percent of the newly-formed venture went to the Wertheimers, with the brothers agreeing to fully financing the production, marketing and distribution of Chanel No. 5.
Mademoiselle Chanel took the remaining 10 percent, and bestowed upon Les Parfums Chanel the legal right to use her name.
The deal went south even more quickly than it was formed. As Dana Thomas wrote for the New York Times in 2002, “Feeling she had been cheated, [Coco] Chanel filed lawsuit after lawsuit, trying to get more control and more of the profits. By 1928 … the Wertheimers had a lawyer on their staff who dealt solely with [Ms.] Chanel.”
That, however, was only the beginning in what would become a lengthy battle, and things took a significant turn in the spring of 1940 when the Nazis invaded France.