NEW YORK — The independent food publication that revived the Gourmet name earlier this year has agreed to rebrand and stop using the trademark following a legal dispute with Condé Nast.
The worker-owned publication is now operating under the temporary name [Untitled Food Magazine]. Its five founders said they plan to use the placeholder through August before introducing a more complete brand identity as September approaches.
The change is part of a confidential settlement with Condé Nast, according to an announcement published by the founders Tuesday. Financial terms and other provisions of the agreement were not disclosed.
The publication said its editorial operation will continue. Its stories, recipes, editors and twice-weekly publishing schedule are expected to remain in place while the name, visual identity and reader communications change.
A staged transition for readers
The founders are taking a gradual approach to the rebrand. For now, subscribers will continue receiving messages from the publication’s existing email account, and paid subscriptions will still be billed by Goulash Unlimited LLC, the company behind the venture.
The temporary identity is already visible across the publication’s website, where the masthead now reads [Untitled Food Magazine]. The bracketed name functions as both a placeholder and an explanation to readers who may encounter the publication without knowing about the trademark dispute.
The founders said readers should expect additional notices during the transition. The staged rollout is designed to reduce confusion while the publication develops its permanent name and design system.
That process presents a familiar branding challenge in an unusually public form: preserving audience recognition and trust after losing the name that originally attracted attention. The publication retains its subscribers, editorial voice and body of work, but must transfer that equity to a new identity.
How the trademark conflict developed
Condé Nast shut down the print edition of Gourmet in 2009 after decades as one of the country’s most influential food magazines. The company continued to make Gourmet recipes, articles and videos available through platforms including Epicurious.
A group of five writers and editors relaunched Gourmet in January as an independent digital publication after discovering that a federal trademark registration had lapsed in 2021. The new venture was funded by its founders, operated as a worker-owned cooperative and distributed through the Ghost newsletter platform.
The group introduced a blocky lowercase logo that intentionally departed from the historic magazine’s script masthead. It published one feature and one recipe each week and built an audience of fewer than 10,000 subscribers during its first months.
Condé Nast, legally known as Advance Magazine Publishers Inc., filed a trademark lawsuit against Goulash Unlimited in February in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The complaint alleged trademark infringement under the Lanham Act.
Condé Nast argued that Gourmet remained an active brand because the company continued to derive value from its archive and related content. The independent publication responded that most of Condé Nast’s federal Gourmet registrations had expired and disputed the publisher’s claims of harm.
The settlement ends the immediate fight over the publication’s name without resolving those competing arguments in a public court decision.
The brand now becomes the story
The rebrand will test whether a young media company can separate its emerging identity from the legacy name that accelerated its launch. The founders have said the substance of the magazine will remain intact, giving them continuity in product even as the outward brand changes.
The publication also has an opportunity to build an identity it fully owns. A permanent name can be designed around the cooperative’s current audience, digital format and editorial voice rather than the history of a magazine founded in another era.
For other startups and creative teams, the dispute underscores the difference between an expired federal registration and an uncontested right to use a name. Legacy brands can retain commercial value through archives, licensing and audience recognition even after their original products cease publication.
[Untitled Food Magazine] has not disclosed its permanent name or the designers working on the new identity. The full rebrand is expected to begin around September.