Mr. Wave may have meant legally objectionable as in "the objection that would be the core of the legal case" or "the legal system objects to this". Similar to how a legal complaint doesn't mean someone whining.
I'm afraid I think you're mistaken.
You're allowed to use someone's trademark to factually describe the product you're selling. You don't need the owner's permission to do that.
If you're selling an actual Apple laptop, you can use the trademarks 'Apple' and the Apple logo to describe it.
If you're selling an actual Bob's Burger, you can use that trademark and logo to describe it.
apple-sf.com (and the various food delivery sites being discussed) pass themselves off as the restaurant. It's not clear to a casual user that the order is being processed by a 3rd party.
Uber successfully had an app taken down that helped drivers determine whether Uber had cheated them out of wages they were owed. The important thing is that unless the people of UberCheats have a lot of money and time to burn they can't really challenge Uber's actions here.
Hell, a few weeks ago Apple forced a company to change their logo of a green pear because they claimed it was infringing on the Apple logo[2].
Somewhere in the product description, advertising, is the word "FOR".
Lightning cable FOR Apple iPhone.
Belking trying to sell the same cable as "Apple iPhone Lightning cable" would be problematic. Leaving aside licensing issues.
The proof is in the pudding. Go to one of the websites they register for a restaurant, and see just how many references to "We are not the restaurant, but we are reselling and delivering their food". Hint: rather few.
Call the number on the website. "Hello, I can take your order for [restaurant name]!"
"Is this [restaurant]?"
"I can take your order!"
Because all of the above isn't defensible. They're not just (re) selling the restaurant's food, they are implying that they -are- the restaurant.
Behavior here becomes important. Deception and context. Why in these cases if Deliveroo/Uber/etc were comfortable with their process would they not say "This is Uber Eats, and we can take orders for [restaurant]"? This again comes back to one of those definitions of fraud, "dishonestly obtaining financial advantage (your cut of the order, inflated pricing, etc) by deception (explicitly stating or repeatedly implying that you are the restaurant)".
and other vague hand-waving answer designed to imply that you are talking to the restaurant and avoiding the answer, "No this is a call center for a delivery service".
I don't like the colour of your shirt, so I'm going to say it's objectionable. It doesn't break any laws or infringe any regulations, but I want a judge's opinion on it anyway.
See?
In the case of passing off a service you offer as begin the service of another company, there is a clear legal case to answer. And as I recall this is settled caselaw in the UK and the people pretending to be other companies are in the wrong.
It wastes the time of the defendant and the legal service, which harms society.
It imagine it's also super stressful and expensive for the defendant to go through, even when it's thrown out.
Consider: - Cutting your grass at 8am when your neighbour works nights.
- A well off person putting their child up for adoption because they don't want the hassle.
- Payday loans given to people you know won't be able to pay them off, ensuring they pay you far more than the value of the loan.
- Banks processing payments out of order to trigger overdraft fees that would otherwise not have been collected.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1125#a
1125(a)(1) is pretty unambiguous in this context. If Grubhub is using a restaurant's name to "deceive as to ... the origin, sponsorship, or approval of his or her goods", that's cause for civil action.
California also has a new law explicitly addressing this issue:
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...
... and yes, there's an aptly-named website called https://www.grubhublawsuit.com/ describing a class-action lawsuit on this specific topic.
And no, that website isn't an infringement of Grubhub's mark if it's not likely to be confused with Grubhub's business. (It'd be a different story if Grubhub were a law firm in the business of filing class action lawsuits.)
Your linked law suit is about something entirely different to what's being discussed in this thread - that's about describing restaurants as shut when they aren't.
https://www.classlawgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/Grubhub-Cla...
You're not allowed to use trademarks to masquerade as the other party, especially if you're then trying to conduct business as if you were that other party.
Taking a step back: is there any trademark usage that you view as infringing?
Using an example from another side discussion: I hope we can agree that if you made a laptop and called it a Macbook Pro, Apple would sue the heck out of you, and they'd be in the right. Where we seem to disagree is whether it's infringement if you set up a storefront, name it "Apple Store", and exclusively sell products that you've purchased from an Apple-run Apple Store.
There's also a very large body of trademark specific law which may specifically address this. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_off
But the food isn't being misrepresented! It is the food of the restaurant. Passing off means pretending the product is something it isn't. That isn't what is happening here at all.
You and a few others seem to be under some kind of mistaken understanding that the food is 'fake' or from a fraudulent dark kitchen not actually associated with the restaurant? That's not the case. It's the actual real food from the actual restaurant, resold.
I'm not under a mistaken understanding. I'm explicitly saying that you might not have to misrepresent the food itself: if you insert yourself as an intermediary but claim to be the underlying provider, there's potential for confusion and damage to the goodwill of the underlying provider, and that is what passing off fundamentally protects against.
I don't know if it would fly, but you asked and that's a place a case might be found.
The broader point here: it's one thing to advertise selling someone else's product. It's another to _pretend to be them_.
The service of delivery is what is being passed off.