A tiny Bainbridge Island web design firm is taking on ecommerce giant Amazon.com in a trademark dispute involving Amazon’s new “Windowshop” tool.

Geoff Daigle, the owner of Daigle Design, has a trademark for the term “Window Shopping” dating back to 2002 for his firm’s online shopping portal. He’s taken issue with Amazon over its use of the term “Windowshop” for its new experimental online feature that lets people browse products in a moving, three-dimensional grid.

Daigle’s attorney has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Amazon, which Amazon’s law firm rejected. So far, the dispute has not gone to court, and it’s not clear if Daigle, who runs Daigle Design with his wife Candace, plans to legally challenge Amazon, the world’s biggest ecommerce company with a market value of $35 billion.

“This would definitely be on Amazon’s radar screen,” said Michael Atkins, a Seattle trademark attorney with Graham & Dunn PC who does not represent Amazon or Daigle. “All companies take allegations of trademark infringement seriously, because it affects how they do business on a day to day basis.”

But Atkins, who blogs at seattletrademarklawyer.com, said it can be challenging for a small firm to mount a legal challenge over a trademark.

“The little company usually doesn’t have the money to duke it out in court with the bigger, more established company. These lawsuits can be very expensive,” potentially costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, he said.

Daigle’s attorney sent a letter to Amazon on Feb. 2 of this year, saying the company’s use of “Amazon Windowshop Beta” and the domain name www.windowshop.com violates Daigle’s trademark, and asking Amazon to stop using it. Amazon’s law firm, Knobbe, Martens, Olson & Bear LLP responded with its own letter March 9, arguing that “window shop” is a generic term and warning that therefore Daigle’s trademark is “vulnerable to cancellation.”

“It was essentially saying, ‘If you mess with us, we will nuke you,’” said Daigle’s attorney, Yale Lewis, of Seattle-based Hendricks & Lewis PLLC.

Lewis, who has represented glass artist Dale Chihuly and singer Courtney Love, declined to say what the Daigles plan to do next but said they are “considering their options.”

Patricia Smith, a spokeswoman for Amazon.com, had no comment on the trademark matter. Susan Natland of Knobbe Martens Olson & Bear, who responded to Daigle’s original cease-and-desist letter, didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Amazon unveiled “Amazon Windowshop” in October 2008. The experimental feature lets people scroll through books, music and other items in 3-D and zoom in on individual products.

Amazon on Jan. 19 filed an application for a trademark of “AMAZONWINDOW SHOP” for a variety of interactive shopping services.

Daigle said his firm’s Window Shopping portal, a bare-bones web site that provides links to other shopping sites, has generated “a small amount of income” but said it’s a “great brand.”

He said his firm has been an Amazon affiliate for many years, linking to Amazon in exchange for a percentage of any resulting sales.

“Even though we’re a small player in their scheme of things,” Daigle said, “it’s not like we’re invisible to them.”

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