Tesco has been ordered to stop using its Clubcard motif after a judge ruled the supermarket had copied Lidl's logo in an attempt to “deceive” customers.

Britain's largest supermarket will be forced to pull the yellow and blue Clubcard logo from shelves after losing the long-running High Court trademark battle. 

Tesco copied Lidl's logo to stop "financially squeezed customers" switching to its German rival, according to Judge Joanna Smith. 

The judge ruled that, while there had been no specific intention by Tesco to "free-ride on Lidl’s reputation", the Clubcard logo had been designed to "cause a 'subtle but insidious' transfer of image from the [Lidl logo] to the [Clubcard logo] in the minds of some consumers". 

She said: “This will have assisted Tesco to increase the attraction of their prices.”

The decision follows years of legal wrangling between the two supermarkets, with Lidl claiming in 2021 that Tesco's marketing reminded shoppers too much of its own branding.

Lidl’s logo features the shop's name in a yellow circle on a blue background.

Tesco first rolled out its Clubcard prices in 2019, using a yellow circle on a blue square with overlaid text to promote it.

Judge Joanna Smith said the similarity “establishes the existence of deception”.  

The judge also ruled that Tesco's design agency had copied the background from Lidl's logo and that the British supermarket “adopted that copy as the basis for the [Clubcard logo] Signifier”. 

Tesco has argued that the yellow circle trademark was “a figment of Lidl’s legal imagination”.

A Lidl GB spokesman said: “Over the last three years, Tesco has been using its Clubcard logo to deceive many customers into believing that Tesco was price matching against Lidl or was able to offer the same great value as us.

“This infringement allowed Tesco to take unfair advantage of our longstanding reputation for great value, misleading their customers at a time when they should have been supporting them. We are pleased that the Court has agreed with us and that it will now order Tesco to stop using the Clubcard logo.”

The ruling comes amid an escalating price war among UK supermarkets, as traditional stores scramble to stop their shoppers switching to Aldi and Lidl. 

The German discounters recorded sales growth of more than 25pc over the past year, compared to around 6pc growth at the traditional stores. 

Last summer, Aldi overtook Morrisons to become Britain's fourth largest supermarket, in a sign of their growing popularity among shoppers.

Tesco was approached for comment.