Teen Says Oakland A Stole His “stOAKed” Clothing Design He Imagined In 2012 In High School
- Ryan Frigo designed the “stoaked” logo for a high school class in 2012 and started selling clothes with the word
- The term is intended to promote civic pride in Frigo’s hometown of Oakland
- Last month, the Oakland A’s started selling a t-shirt with the same word “stacked” on it.
- After the media coverage emerged, Majestic, the maker of the shirt, said it would remove the design from the online stories
A 16-year-old aspiring fashion designer says the Oakland A’s stole his “stOAKed” logo and used it to sell t-shirts for the baseball team.
Ryan Frigo, a proud Oakland native, says he created the logo over two years ago as part of a high school design class. Since then he has been selling t-shirts, hoodies, beanies and other products with the design.
“I started this business to combat negative perceptions and promote Oakland in my freshman year at Oakland Tech,” Mr. Frigo told KNTV.
Ryan Frigo says he designed the “stoaked” logo in 2012 to help promote pride in his hometown of Oakland, California.
The A’s started selling their own ‘stacked’ shirts last month – though the team has since removed the merchandise from their online store.
Mr Frigo, pictured, says the A’s either purposely stole his idea or thought they might get away with taking his design because he’s just a teenager
Last month, the Atheltics online store began offering t-shirts labeled “STOAKED” – printing the “oak” of the world in Athletics Yellow. The jerseys were meant to celebrate the teams’ playoffs last season.
After Mr. Frigo’s story was picked up by local media, the company that made the shirt, Majestic, announced that it would stop selling the shirts “as a sign of goodwill.”
Since 2012, Mr. Frigo has been selling his “STOAKED” clothing which also emphasizes the “oak” in the word.
He does not have a mark on his clothes because the word “stoked” had already been filed by someone.
Mr. Frigo maintains, however, that he owns a “common law trademark”, as he has been using this term for years.
He believes that A deliberately ignored his earlier use of the term.
“Maybe they saw it was a kid from Oakland who doesn’t have a huge business like them and said, ‘Oh, we can probably get away with using it.’ , he told the East Bay Express.
On his blog, he writes: “Even if it was a coincidence, every professional is supposed to, at least, ‘equip themselves’ with Google. If they had, this website would have appeared first. Either they flew straight to stOAKed, either they didn’t bother to do a second of research, or they didn’t think twice before harming the business.
