Twenty One Pilots Targets Bootleg Merch in Temu Trademark Suit

Twenty One Pilots performing live. Photo Credit: Mr. Rossi

The namesake company behind Twenty One Pilots has fired off a trademark infringement suit against Temu over its alleged “knowing and systematic marketing and sale of counterfeit” merch.

Twenty One Pilots, LLC submitted the straightforward action to a California federal court yesterday. Unsurprisingly, the complaint doesn’t exactly paint Temu, allegedly “one of the most unethical companies operating in today’s global marketplace” and “a veritable swamp of infringing and otherwise illegal products,” in a positive light.

Moving beyond this top-level criticism and getting down to the actual allegations, the plaintiff has specifically taken issue with Temu’s alleged sale of “a myriad of items that are counterfeit or blatant copies of Plaintiff’s artwork, trademarks, and intellectual property.”

Chief among said items are t-shirts available at far lower prices than those sold via the official Twenty One Pilots merch store, per the text. And rather than rattling off each of the other allegedly infringing products, the filing party went ahead and attached screenshots appearing to show the relevant Temu listings.

According to the images, which make up close to half the 43-page suit, the allegedly infringing items include but aren’t limited to all sorts of apparel, phone cases, travel mugs, and wall art.

Overall, then, the plaintiff is seeking a hefty pile of damages, an order barring Temu “from engaging in the misconduct” highlighted above, and more. DMN reached out to Temu parent PDD for comment but didn’t immediately receive a response.

(Technically, the complaint is against Whaleco, which operates as Temu in the States. But Whaleco itself doesn’t seem to have a dedicated website or media contact.)

Incidentally, a company associated with the estate of MF Doom tagged Temu with a substantially similar trademark infringement suit last month.

But the wider “war on counterfeits” certainly isn’t confined to the online marketplace, which the FTC and DOJ on Monday announced had agreed to pay $2 million “to resolve allegations that it violated the INFORM Consumers Act.”

A recent example: Ceremony of Roses’ complaint targeting alleged Benson Boone merch counterfeiters. Just one such suit levied by the Sony Music subsidiary to this point in 2025 – July delivered an action focusing on Zach Bryan merch, for instance – the litigation arrived in tandem with Boone’s ongoing world tour.

Twenty One Pilots’ own tour kicked off last year and will wrap late next month – though the second North American leg will begin in Cincinnati on September 18th.