Shoney's, Inc. v. Schoenbaum

PHILLIPS, Circuit Judge:

This appeal arises from a dispute over use of the well-known restaurant and motel trade-name, “Shoney’s,” that arose when Shoney’s Lodging, Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Shoney’s, Inc. of Tennessee, licensed use of the trade-name “Shoney’s Inn” to a motel facility located in an area of eastern Virginia in which the defendants Leon and Ruth Ann Schoenbaum held a previous license for the exclusive operation of restaurants under the “Shoney’s” trade-name. The specific dispute was whether the preexisting license agreement only protected the Schoenbaums from use of the…