Corporate and Commercial
Owner Managed Businesses

Charlotte Hamilton
June 2026

For many founders, particularly in creative industries, there is no cleaner way to build a brand than to build it around yourself. Your name, your reputation, your story. The business grows because of who you are. But what happens when you sell that business — or leave it — and the name you built it on goes with it?

This is not a hypothetical question. It is one that has played out in some of the most striking commercial disputes of recent years, and it carries real lessons for any founder considering a sale, an employment arrangement or a partnership where your personal identity is part of the commercial offering.

When you sell the name, you sell more than a word

Jo Malone sold her fragrance business to The Estée Lauder Companies in 1999, transferring not just the brand but the contractual rights to her name in commercial contexts. She left in 2006, launched Jo Loves in 2011, and began a fragrance collaboration with Zara in 2019. In early 2026, Estée Lauder filed legal action against her for breach of contract, trademark infringement and passing off — a concept in English law referring to misleading consumers into believing goods or services are connected to another business — all centred on the words “in collaboration with perfume Ms Jo Malone CBE, founder of Jo Loves” appearing on Zara’s promotional material.

When the clock runs slowly

When Bobbi Brown sold her cosmetics brand to Estée Lauder in 1995, she signed a 25-year non-compete. She left the company in 2016, spent years waiting out the remainder of her restriction — reportedly wearing a charm necklace engraved with its expiration date — and launched Jones Road Beauty the day it expired in October 2020. The brand has since grown to approach a $1 billion valuation.

This was a US dispute, and a 25-year restriction would face serious challenge under English law. UK courts will not simply enforce whatever the parties agreed;

When your name is licensed, not sold

Bridal designer Hayley Paige signed an employment contract in 2011 that gave her employer, JLM Couture, the rights to her name and her designs. When she sought to renegotiate in 2019, she was sued for using her own name and lost the right to design wedding dresses under it during the litigation. In 2024, following a settlement, she paid $263,000 to reacquire her name, her intellectual property and her social media accounts. She released a comeback collection in 2025.

Again, a US case — but the underlying issue resonates in any jurisdiction: signing away your name rights early in your career, without fully understanding the long-term implications, can cost you far more than you bargained for.

What this means for UK founders

These cases share a common thread: founders who built businesses around their personal identity, and later found that identity contractually constrained in ways they had not anticipated. For UK founders — whether selling a business, entering an employment arrangement or taking on investment involving any assignment of IP or brand rights.

These are the questions worth asking before you sign:

What are you licensing or transferring?

Name rights, trademarks and goodwill can be transferred independently of the business itself. Be precise about what you are giving up and in which contexts.

What restrictions apply after exit?

Non-compete and non-solicitation clauses in UK sale agreements are enforceable where reasonable. Courts look at time, geography and the scope of restricted activities.

Does the restriction apply to you personally?

There is an important distinction between a company selling a brand and an individual agreeing to restrict their own future conduct. Both are possible in the same transaction — but they need to be understood separately.

What happens to your name in a commercial context post-completion?

If your name is being transferred or licensed as a trademark, understand precisely what you can and cannot do with it going forward — including on social media, in collaborations and in any new ventures.

Are there protections built in for you as an individual?

The right to use your own name for non-commercial purposes, to reference your professional history, or to be identified as a founder are all capable of being preserved — but only if negotiated and documented properly.

Founders who build businesses around who they are should take as much care over the legal architecture of their name as they do over the commercial architecture of the business itself. Once those rights are transferred, reclaiming them is rarely straightforward — and can, as these cases show, take years.

A note on jurisdiction: the Bobbi Brown and Hayley Paige cases arose under US law. The legal frameworks — particularly around non-compete enforceability — differ materially from the position in England and Wales. The commercial lessons, however, translate universally.