13 Feb 2013

Settlement reached over British Marmite

8:47 pm on 13 February 2013

Sanitarium has announced it has reached an out-of-court settlement with an importer of British Marmite who it believes breached the company's trademark rights.

A High Court hearing scheduled for next week has been cancelled.

A spokesperson for Sanitarium says the settlement allows 1908 jars of the British version of the breakfast spread to be sold in New Zealand as a one-off.

It can only be sold in specialist stores for British imported products and the jars will be relabelled so the word Marmite is not visible.

The spokesperson says the agreement protects New Zealand Marmite's trademark.

The importer is required to re-label any future Marmite imports before they are sold in New Zealand.

NZ spread back on shelves in March

Sanitarium has announced that Marmite is back in production and will be on supermarket shelves by 20 March.

Production of the spread has been on hold for the past 15 months due to earthquake damage at the firm's plant in Christchurch.

General manager Pierre van Heerden says Marmite is being packaged and stockpiled until there is enough for a nationwide release next month.

Mr van Heerden says after months of repair work, the factory is now safe and all the original production equipment is running smoothly.

He says significant media attention has helped keep the product in people's minds and Marmite will be sold to retailers at the same price it has always been.