MinTat sees yellow over identical ideas

In February 1998, Minale Tattersfield was invited by Yellow Pages to present proposals for a new Talking Pages brand as part of a paid pitch.

One of the three concepts we presented was based on yellow items – ducks, bananas, lemons.

We did not secure the pitch. Imagine how surprised we were to see Yellow Pages relaunched by Johnson Banks, using the same yellow items as we had presented.

We do not dispute Johnson Banks’ integrity, and Yellow Pages tells us that the work was commenced before our presentation. We do accept the “great minds think alike” theory, but this raises a question about intellectual copyright of designs presented in a pitch and the trust which we place in our clients.

Do Design Week readers have any suggestions about protecting the copyright of their design work in pitch presentations?

Alex Maranzano

Managing director

Minale Tattersfield & Partners

Surrey TW9 1AJ