I love Victoria Secret stuff but this is the first time I heard this.

Victoria's Secret Sued Over Bra Design
By LARRY NEUMEISTER,AP
Posted: 2008-04-22 09:24:17
NEW YORK (April 21) - A woman sued Victoria's Secret on Monday, claiming the lingerie company's latest secret is that they stole her idea for a bra whose straps can be worn different ways.


Katerina Plew, a 38-year-old mother of four, including triplets, said she filed for a patent for her invention in the hopes of making some money to help her raise her kids on her own.

"I thought it was the answer to my dreams, but it was the answer to their dreams," she said.

Frank Joseph Colucci, a lawyer for Victoria's Secret, did not immediately return a telephone message for comment on the lawsuit, which was filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. Victoria's Secret is a unit of Limited Brands.

She is seeking unspecified damages, and an order to force the company from infringing on her patent.

Plew, who works as a paralegal in a family law office, said she created the bra in 1999 after she became frustrated that she could not hide her bra straps.

Her design calls for a strip of fabric loops along the top of the cups and torso band so the straps can be detached and reattached in different ways to hide them under the outer garment. She said she filed for a patent for the bra in 2002 and received it in 2004.

Plew said she arranged a meeting with Victoria's Secret to pitch the product two years ago, after telling them she had secured a patent and e-mailing them a mock-up of the bra she had made.

She said the company canceled the meeting as she was driving into Manhattan from her home on Long Island.

"They said their legal team advised them against it. Then a year later I walked into Victoria's Secret and guess what I saw on their shelf?" she said.

Victoria's Secret sells a 100-way strapless convertible bra that it describes as having three sets of straps that hook into eyelets to wear 100 ways.

Plew said she had no doubt about where the product originated.

"That's my bra. They made my bra," she said she recalled thinking, before bursting into tears. "The young girl at the register would have thought I was a loon."

Wasn't this woman on American Inventor the first season 2006? I think the woman had three kids and was a paralegal.

That's what I was thinking?!?

__________________

Talk about low. Shame on VS!!!

__________________
Sarah

If she secured a patent before they made it, she should get a BUNDLE from them. Too bad she'll have to fight for it, but hey,, may turn out to be the best thing that could happen... *crosses fingers for her*

__________________




Think big! Change the world! One A.R.K at a time.

Except bras that have straps that can be detached and reattached different ways have been around the whole time I've worn a bra. This is silly, she didn't invent that.