Ravinia Brewing Company faces threat of closure in trademark dispute with Ravinia Festival

CHICAGO - For nearly six years, Ravinia Brewing has been serving craft beer in Highland Park, more recently at a taproom in Logan Square. But now, they say they’re in danger of being bullied out of business by the much bigger Ravinia music festival.

Jeff Hoobler and his partners opened the tiny Ravinia Brewing Company in Highland Park in 2018, making small batches of beer with big flavor, then later expanded to a larger taproom in Logan Square.

"We are a little operation that doesn’t make money," said Hoobler. "Which is kind of funny because we’re supposedly the for-profit business, but this is a labor of love for the guys who do it."

But that passion turned to frustration late last year when they got a letter, and then a lawsuit from the managers of the nearby Ravinia Festival claiming that the brewery is infringing on their name trademark.

"We would have never thought there was any concern over the name Ravinia," said Hoobler. "You could just go up and down the street. Now Ravinia closets, there’s a Ravinia coffee shop. There’s a Ravinia speakeasy opening."

When the brewery first opened, he said they signed an agreement with Ravinia Festival allowing them to use the name, so long as the brewery did not make any representations that it was associated with the festival.

Hoobler said they’ve lived up to that agreement. But now, because of the lawsuit, they’ve spent nearly $100,000 in legal fees to defend themselves, which could very well put the brewery out of business.

"You have legal fees, you have surveys, you have expert witnesses that we’re going to have to spend money on if this doesn’t get resolved quickly," said Hoobler. "And we’ve already spent a lot of money on."

Ravinia Brewing has started a GoFundMe campaign, and they’re getting a lot of support from people in the community who love their beer and their brewery as a place to meet.

So far, customers have raised over $10,000 for the brewery’s GoFundMe — and Ravinia hopes to raise more money by brewing a new beer, a Vienna Lager appropriately named "Community Matters."

"The neighborhood here loves this place. The people in the city love the place. We are in distribution. A lot of people really like our beers," said Hoobler. "And a lot of people are going to be very disappointed if another storefront goes empty in Highland Park and Chicago."

In a statement, a spokesperson for Ravinia Festivals responded:

"After repeated attempts to resolve this matter amicably, Ravinia filed its lawsuit against Ravinia Brewing Company (RBC) to protect Ravinia’s reputation earned over the past 100 years of serving our Chicagoland community. RBC has completely disregarded an agreement we struck in 2018 and reaped profits by trading off Ravinia’s name and reputation. While RBC continues to make baseless claims and perpetuate misinformation, we remain committed to resolving this matter as soon as possible."