Leopard Doesn’t Change Spots: Quinn Emanuel Wins Ruling Against American Eagle for Small Business

Quinn Emanuel has secured a preliminary injunction for JS China Sourcing to stop American Eagle Outfitters from infringing on our client’s trademark.

We fight equally hard for clients big and little, and earned a Litigator of the Week Runner-Up honor from Law.com for the ruling. JSC is a small New York City business that manufactures high-quality women’s clothes in China, imports them with appealing brand names, and sells them to major retailers such as Charlotte Russe, Burlington, and Target. One of its most successful lines is a women’s sleepwear brand called Overslept, for which JSC obtained a federal trademark registration in 2019.

This summer American Eagle Outfitters launched a line of sleepwear for women and teenage girls called Overslept by Aerie, with a campaign in all of its stores. The mark was nearly identical to JSC’s, and the products were almost identical too. AEO later admitted it had known about JSC’s Overslept mark since September 2025, almost a year before launching its brand. 

JSC wasn’t having it.

QE partner Marc Greenwald, a founding member of QE’s New York office, introduced the business to Jessica Rose, Of Counsel at the firm, who is a formidable combination of trademark specialist and litigation strategist. The company hired us. Having recruited associate Elizabeth Bishop, another trademark wunderkind, the team drafted the injunction motion to prevent AEO from using the infringing mark during the pendency of the case and, in particular, the approaching busy holiday season.

American Eagle’s opposition was voluminous, including a trademark survey, an 88-page report from a marketing expert arguing that JSC’s brand isn’t a brand, and the citation of some niche infringers that have used the word Overslept. We were ready. With four days to turn in our reply, we pulled off the rare feat of filing a day early, so that U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska in Manhattan federal court would have extra time to consider it. 

On October 29 Judge Preska heard argument and then delivered her order on the record, granting the preliminary injunction against American Eagle. She agreed with JSC on every issue and factor, emphasizing AEO’s bad faith in adopting a mark it knew was already registered and used in connection with women’s sleepwear by JSC.

At one point the team asked permission to pass two pairs of leopard-print pajamas up to the bench. American Eagle had argued that JSC’s Overslept was just sleepwear, while its own brand, Overslept by Aerie, was a completely different consumer category: “sleep to street.” 

Judge Preska studied the almost identical garments and suggested that wearing your pajamas outside was a personal choice – if a regrettable one – but didn’t make the leopard PJs a different category.