Steve Palmisano spends just about as much time on social media as anyone else, except Palmisano gives special attention to the pages that show an iconic Albuquerque logo.
Palmisano is the owner of the Albuquerque Dukes store in Nob Hill, and owns the logo of the bygone AAA baseball team. But because it’s such a prevalent, almost inescapable image in New Mexico, people often see it as a logo of the people. That permeating philosophy becomes a burden for Palmisano because the Dukes — and the brand — are his livelihood. Burqeños of a certain age know the famous face of the duke adorned with a bright yellow helmet. Even those too young to remember the now-defunct baseball team, probably recognize the logo as a quintessential Albuquerque staple. Palmisano says the misunderstanding about who owns the logo often becomes apparent when he comes across unauthorized uses while he pursues the internet.
“Even though they try to change the logo in some way, they will end up tagging Dukes or tagging Albuquerque,” Palmisano says. “So it’s easier now, to be honest, with the advent of social media, Instagram, Facebook, all that metadata that helps you set up searches and different things that will invariably pop up. But most of the time, it’s friends or family or customers that will send the link over a screenshot and say, ‘Hey, did you see this guy?’ That’s what friends are for. But it happens more often than people think. Currently, I’ve had four in the last week. Usually it’s once a month.”
But Steve’s not alone, owners of other popular New Mexico sports logos such as the Albuquerque Isotopes baseball team and New Mexico United soccer team often have to work double duty, self-policing artists and vendors who use the images without permission, and coming up with creative ways to protect their intellectual property and their money.
But while it’s mostly common knowledge that active teams like the Isotopes and United don’t allow unauthorized use of their logos, Palmisano often finds that many people incorrectly assume the Dukes logo is fair game.
“I’m not complaining necessarily that it’s popular,” he says. “I guess the challenge for me is when you have to go out and protect it and you become the bad guy, because the knowledge base is not there for a lot of people who are using it.”
The Duke of baseball past
The Dukes started playing in Albuquerque in 1915. They started as a Class-D franchise and eventually became AAA — the highest level in Minor League Baseball. But when a new owner took the team to Portland, Oregon, in 2000 and rebranded the team as the Beavers, the old Dukes logo sat unused. Eventually Palmisano teamed up with businessman Fred Matteucci and the two took over the rights of the brand and logo.
Palmisano says there was a short period of time when there wasn’t a “gatekeeper” for the Dukes logo, sparking a “kind of a free-for-all” for anyone who wanted to sport the brand.
“You’d see stickers and you’d see T-shirts pop up,” Palmisano says. “So when Fred got it back, he was on a mission to say, ‘Hey, I own this, you can’t sell it, you can’t make up a shirt with it,’ which is business, and that’s why people have things trademarked.”
The Dukes Store opened in 2015, and Palmisano says it was evident from day one that it was a viable business. His goal was to keep the logo alive because the goatee and mustache clad Albuquerque Duke is a fragment of both New Mexico history and tradition and the history of Minor League Baseball — “part of old baseball” — as Palmisano puts it.
“The math that I’ve come up with is if you are in your early 30s and you’re from Albuquerque, you probably went to a game when you were 10,” Palmisano says. “As far as the baseball team, that’s the window. As far as it becoming an iconic symbol of Albuquerque, New Mexico, it could last a while. We have a large demographic or a large customer base that only knows the Dukes as that. It’s a symbol of where you’re from — culturally, demographically — so it could shift to a brand like that. It’s sort of a lifestyle brand.”
By 2020, Matteucci moved away from Albuquerque, and Palmisano was the only person running the Dukes Store during COVID. He bought the business and trademark from Matteucci that same year.
And while Palmisano spends a good chunk of his time protecting the logo he owns, it’s not just fargone teams that see logos being used unlawfully.
Sometimes you have to play hardball
It’s usually much easier to snag a copy of the Dukes logo and throw it on a hat unnoticed than it is with an existing and active team.
New Mexico United President Ron Patel says the soccer franchise came out of the gate strong and quickly gained popularity. Because of this, they encountered people using their logo without permission from year one.
“What 99.9% of sports teams would do is send a cease and desist letter,” he says. “We said, ‘Is that really the way to reach out to artists in our community as our first impression?’”
United came up with an innovative way of dealing with potential copyright infringement. They have created a program that allows United to feature local art and help artists sell more of their work, while at the same time protecting the integrity of their brand.
Patel says United developed an Artist Series program that pays local artists a fair price for their art. The soccer club then marks it up and sells the specialty merchandise in a retail store, but the profits don’t go into the team’s pockets.
“We donate it to our academy, which is a youth program where the kids don’t pay a dime for their soccer in their age of 15 to 19. They play all across the country, and it’s run by our foundation,” Patel says.
Patel says besides helping aspiring soccer players, United is also helping local artists get their work seen by a larger audience.
“If they try to sell it on their website, they’ll sell it to their followers. But if we sell it in our store, we reach our entire sphere of influence, and are able to recycle those revenues by paying for kids to play soccer,” Patel says. “So, kind of a win-win-win for everybody.”
Palmisano says he doesn’t usually lease out the Dukes logo to others, “just based on the history of it not working out.”
The Albuquerque Isotopes team sometimes finds itself in a similar position. The team has dealt with unauthorized use of its brand ever since they announced the logo in 2002. Isotopes General Manager John Traub says, “Borrow is one way to put it, stealing is another way to put it. That’s why there’s intellectual property laws. People put a lot of equity into their branding and it’s very important that those things get protected.”
“We have our attorneys or Major League Baseball’s attorneys get ahold of the offenders and hopefully can solve things without litigation,” Traub says. “I will tell you that we have had a number of people who also reach out to us in advance of using our branding — asking for permission — which is very much appreciated.”
Traub says he understands the philosophical argument that hometown brands such as The Dukes, United and Isotopes belong to the people, but that there’s also a legal argument in protecting a brand.
“Communities have a lot of pride in their logos, and it’s awesome when people have that pride and they want to use your logos or your branding for certain purposes,” Traub says. “However, when they try to capitalize on the work that you’ve put into it, or when they’re trying to misuse your name or your logos, there’s a real problem with that.”
Use it or lose it
Seth Gardenswartz*, a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property, says like it or not, logos, phrases or sometimes colors with registered trademarks are off limits.
“For a trademark, you can’t use a name, a symbol, a word, a sound, a smell, a color, or anything else that could indicate source in a way that would confuse a consumer,” Gardenswartz says.
“That’s why if you go trying to sell jewelry of any type in a turquoise package, a flock of attorneys will apparate around you from Tiffany’s and grind you into the ground. That color is a registered trademark.
Gardenswartz agrees with Traub about a community owning a logo and says it’s “fundamentally untrue” that a logo such as the one for the Dukes is free for everyone to use.
“Just saying that doesn’t make it true,” he says.
Gardenswartz says logos like the Dukes, United and Isotopes are protected by trademark ownership, but keeping unauthorized businesses or organizations from using intellectual property falls on owners.
“There is no trademark police,” Gardenswartz says. “You can’t just call the police and say, ‘Someone’s infringing on my trademark.’”
Trademarking a logo doesn’t necessarily mean that the image is off limits forever. Gardenswartz says that the images must be used, or they may be up for grabs by savvy entrepreneurs like Matteucci and Palmisano.
“Trademark registrations have to be maintained, and between the fifth and sixth year after the mark is registered, there’s maintenance. You basically have to prove that you’re still using it. And then again, after the 10th year, and every 10th year after that,” Gardenswartz says.
Palmisano understands that the Duke is a symbol of Albuquerque, but it’s also his livelihood. He says he wants people to know it’s no cakewalk to own a business like his.
“Before you have an idea like, ‘Hey, I’m gonna make a skateboard and put the Dukes logo on it’ or something, think twice about, maybe somebody owns that,” he says.
*Seth Gardenswartz has represented Ctrl + P Publishing, which publishes The Paper.