There's been plenty of people who have come into our shop and asked if we could put a Buffalo Bills logo onto some items, or some other kind of copyrighted character/logo.

My usual response is just to tell them we do not own the rights to reproduce such characters/logos so we cannot help.

They're usually understanding and most of the time follow it up with "yeah , I figured so."

 

Tell them you'll be happy to do it as long as they get permission in writing from Warner Brothers.

 

There is a form that can be filled out from Warner Brothers to request to obtain a license to use the characters for the intended purpose. If they give you the "ok", then you are good to proceed.

If a customer comes to us with ANY artwork, we do a quick image search on Google using the upload image option to double check sources. We just had a customer last week that was pulling stuff off Google and was trying to pass it all off as original artwork. We told him that we could draw something up that was original, we could try to get a license to use the art, or he could continue his search for a printer.

 

We told him that we could draw something up that was original, we could try to get a license to use the art, or he could continue his search for a printer.

Love it. I'm gonna keep that one in my back pocket.

 

I thought this would be the response. Thanks everyone!

 

It all depends on the integrity of your shop. I see tons of "crafters" on fb selling tshirts with glitter lips that have NFL logos on them or college logos I see super heros everywhere and classic cartoons these people don't care about copyright but it is wrong.

The answer as already stated is yes it is illegal without permission I always tell my costumer I can not risk my business for a 15 dollar shirt.

 

Got it! Integrity is very important to my shop. I asked the customer to seek permission or we could work with him to come up with an original idea. He wants Looney tunes so I lost that order, but I still have my shop.

 

Actually I think (check yourself though) the old characters of Looney Tunes are now in the public domain, but you should be careful not to display or mention the names of the characters, which are trademarked.



Also, at least in the UK, I don't think we are obliged to check if the client has the permission to copy. All we have to do, is put it in the T&C, and maybe have a checkbox in the order form, asking for confirmation client. We are of course obliged to stop if notified of an infringement.



The way I see it, the printer does not have to police the copyrights of other people. Who's going to pay for the time required? The printer is not getting paid for the design, and is not selling the design either. All the printer gets paid for is to print.

 

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PublicDomainCharacter

A distinction should be made between public domain characters and public domain works; Bugs Bunny is a trademarked character and not in public domain, but his earliest individual cartoons are.

 

This link was VERY informative. This is exactly what I was looking for. Thank-you very much!