Butler brewing up trademark protection for Big Face Coffee

Move over Starbucks, Big Face Coffee soon could bemoving into the neighborhood.

Because it’s getting real for Jimmy Butler, legal papers and all.

The MiamiHeat All-Star forward is in the process of working with a Pittsburgh legal firm to trademark the name of the impromptu coffee shop he set up in his Disney World hotel room amid the NBA’s quarantine bubble.

What started as a whim has turned into caffeinated capitalism— with a little help froma friend.

“He put the sign up, because, just like everybody, hewas going a little bit stir crazy,” agent Bernie Lee told the Sun Sentinel. “AndthenMeyerstweets a picture of it, and the next thing he knows, he has a business. Incredible.”

As in Heat center Meyers Leonard posting a photo on Twitter of the signage outside Butler’s door, one that Leonard actually soon deletedwhenButler’s room number could be detected.

From that moment, well before theHeat advanced to these Eastern Conference finals against the Boston Celtics, the entrepreneurial spirit took over.

Included in the Sept. 4 trademark filing are the specifics of what began with a black marker on a whiteboard ordered from Amazon, with the legal filing reading:

“The mark consists of The words BIG FACE over the words COFFEE, an asterisk before theCin theword COFFEE, a smiley face design in the O in COFFEE, and an asterisk after the E in COFFEE, with a squiggly line below the word COFFEE, and the words NO I.O.U.s in a white box beneath the squiggly line.”

Lee said a proactive approach became necessary.

“Once the picture went out, I started noticing, I think we all started noticing, people trying to like jump on it,” he said. “And I think before somebody else did it, he definitely did it just to protect himself.

“And nowit’s kind of growing an opportunity.”

The filing said the

Big

Face

Coffee operation includes goods and services such as “general apparel including hats and shirts,” “general housewares including mugs and cups,” “general café items including coffee beans, coffee grounds, candy bars, nuts, tea bags, loose leaf tea, sandwiches; baked goods including scones, muffins, cupcakes, bagels, cakes, cookies, bread, scones, cinnamon rolls, muffins, marshmallow rice treats.”

But wait, there’s more, with the filing also including, “produce including whole fruits, packaged, fruits, vegetables,” and, of course, “non-alcoholic beverages including coffees, teas, sodas, seltzer, bottled water; alcoholic beverages including wine and beer.”

So just a bunch of corporate and legal listings? Not quite.

“No, he did all that,” Lee said of Butler’s product list. “That’s his thing. He’s a detail guy. So he did every one of those line items.

“Say he takes this down the line and he opens his own coffee shop, it potentially covers them for anything that can be sold at the store. So, from the copyright, he can do anything from mugs, T-shirts, clothing. It’s essentially everything. It’s set up, without giving away his whole hand, in a way that if he ever opens up a Big Face Coffee shop, then that’s what he’s going to be able to do.”

With a one-price-fits-all retail concept, Butler’s current hotel-room menu includes Latte, Americano, Mocha, Pour Over, Espresso, Macchiato, Cappuccino, Red Eye and Café Au Lait. The pricing is basic: Small $20; Medium $20; Large $20. Also made clear on the signage are “Cash Only” and “No I.O.U.’s.”

So eventually competition next to AmericanAirlines Arena, in Little Havana … or something grander on a franchise scale?

“He’s going to take it as far as it can go for sure,” Lee said. “He’s going to do as much as he can. It’s been interesting from my perspective, the number of people that have kind of reached out as this kind of has gotten legs and gone on a little bit. Youcan really see the kind of opportunity that’s out there.”