Belwith Products, LLC v. Menard, Inc.

I'll research this case and the asserted patent across the sources you named.

Let me pin down the patent and the actual complaint allegations.

Case overview: Belwith Products, LLC v. Menard, Inc., No. 1:26-cv-01400 (W.D. Mich.)

The parties. Belwith Products, LLC is a Grandville, Michigan designer and manufacturer of decorative cabinet, furniture, and door hardware — founded in 1893 and selling through divisions including Hickory Hardware and Keeler. It is a genuine operating company, not an NPE/PAE, and it has a long history of enforcing its own IP in this same courthouse: it sued Laurey Cabinet Hardware in 2010 over design patent D451,782 plus a copyright registration (Belwith Prods., LLC v. Laurey Cabinet Hardware, No. 1:10-cv-898, stipulated consent judgment, Doc. 29, Dec. 29, 2010, Chief Judge Paul L. Maloney), and in October 2012 sued La‑Z‑Boy subsidiaries Hammary, American Drew, and Kincaid over hardware sourced from third parties (settled mid‑2013). Menard, Inc. is the privately held, Eau Claire, Wisconsin–based big‑box home-improvement chain (Menards). Critically, the two are not strangers: Belwith supplied Menards decorative hardware and free, Belwith‑maintained display cabinets from 2010 to March 31, 2021 under Vendor Compliance Program Letters, per the Court's findings in the earlier case (Belwith Prods., LLC v. Menard, Inc., No. 1:22-cv-00335 (W.D. Mich.), ECF No. 128, slip op. § II).

Accused conduct and patents. Per Law360's May 1, 2026 report, Belwith alleges that after the supplier relationship broke down, Menards "suddenly claimed it owned patented cabinet designs and continued selling them" — i.e., continued commercial use/sale of Belwith-design display fixtures and hardware coupled with an adverse ownership assertion. The case metadata lists U.S. Patent No. 9,004,718; patent-office-derived databases identify that number as "LED decorative illuminated trim system," issued April 14, 2015 from an application filed April 24, 2012, naming Myers et al., assigned to Belwith Products, LLC — in this retail-fixture context, a lighting/illuminated-trim patent that would map onto illuminated display cabinetry rather than onto knobs and pulls. Two honest caveats: (1) the 51-page complaint sits behind the PACER paywall and I could not read its counts, claim charts, or accused-product identification; (2) Law360's phrasing ("patented cabinet designs," plural) suggests the complaint may assert more than the single patent in the case metadata — plausibly design patents of the type Belwith asserted in 2010 — and that additional patents may exist beyond '718. That is unverified and should be confirmed against the complaint (ECF No. 1) before being relied on.

Posture, venue, and why it matters. The suit was filed April 29, 2026 in the Western District of Michigan, Southern Division (Grand Rapids), pleaded as 35 U.S.C. § 271 with NOS 830 and a jury demand; Belwith is represented by Joseph M. Infante of Miller Canfield Paddock & Stone PLC (Grand Rapids). No answer, appearance for Menards, or judge assignment was reflected on public trackers as of the most recent available snapshots — treat "judge unassigned" as provisional. Venue is unremarkable doctrinally (plaintiff's home district, both parties' long history there) but strategically significant because the same court already owns the factual record: in No. 1:22-cv-00335 it denied Menards' motion to compel arbitration (ECF No. 31, Oct. 27, 2022) and, in an August 2025 opinion (ECF No. 128), granted summary judgment to Belwith on ownership of the display cabinets under the 2016 VCPL while denying it as to the 2010 cabinets and dismissing Belwith's conversion claims as duplicative of its breach-of-contract claims. The patent case reads as a re-pleading of that same grievance in IP terms — which is the notable feature here: not an NPE campaign, but a mid-market supplier using § 271 as a second front after contract and conversion theories were trimmed. Expect (a) Menards counterclaims for declaratory judgment of noninfringement/invalidity, plus possible ownership, inventorship, or assignment defenses tied to who paid for and designed the fixtures; (b) argument that Belwith's patents are limited to the specific illuminated-trim embodiments and do not cover the retail display configuration; and (c) a possible early motion on claim preclusion or the scope of the prior judgment. Watch also for design-patent indefiniteness/obviousness defenses if design patents are in fact asserted.

Sourcing notes / open items. I found no PTAB IPR or PGR petitions and no parallel ITC or other district court actions involving '718 or Menards as of today; absence of a Unified Patents or RPX entry is not proof none exists. I could not independently confirm the full asserted-patent list, the accused product SKUs, damages theories, or Menards' counsel from the complaint itself; the Law360 case page, PACER Monitor docket summary, and the CourtListener-hosted ECF No. 128 opinion are the load-bearing sources for the statements above.

I'll research the docket and any related proceedings.

Let me pull the docket detail and look for post-filing events.

Bottom line first

As of 2026-10-26, this case has no substantive litigation history to chronicle beyond the complaint. The public docket snapshots available to me show a case that is still at the pleading stage: one filing (the 51-page complaint), no confirmed appearance for Menards, no judge assignment reflected, no Rule 12 motion, no scheduling order, no Markman, no discovery, no trial, and no PTAB proceeding. Everything the user asked me to cover under "pre-trial motions of substance," "claim construction," "discovery milestones," "trial/verdict/post-trial," and "settlement/dismissal/appeal" is, on the present record, empty — and I will say so rather than manufacture milestones.

That said, the chronology is not uninteresting, because the pre-suit and parallel record is dense and directly frames how this case will be litigated.

---

I. Chronological table

Phase 0 — Backdrop in the companion contract case, No. 1:22-cv-00335 (all dated, all sourced)

Two corrections/confirmations to the earlier sections of this summary. First, the prior "August 2025 opinion" is confirmed as dated August 28, 2025, ECF No. 128, authored by Judge Paul L. Maloney — the prior section was right on substance but did not have the exact date. Second, the earlier characterization ("granted SJ to Belwith on 2016 cabinets, denied as to 2010, dismissed conversion claims") is accurate but understates it: the Court denied every one of Belwith's five contract counts in whole or in part (the $1.5M deduction, the $180,731 late-delivery chargeback, the $215,510.59 unpaid-invoice claim, and the implied-contract theory all went to the jury), so Belwith emerged from SJ with ownership of the 2016 cabinets and nothing else. That is the posture in which it filed the patent suit.

Phase 1 — The patent case itself, No. 1:26-cv-01400

Caveat on the docket. The PACER Monitor capture I can see shows entry 1 and nothing else, but its own header reads "Last checked: … 29, 2026" and "Docket last updated: 3 hours ago," i.e., the extract is incomplete relative to the live docket. It is possible that an answer, corporate disclosure, or Rule 12 motion exists on PACER and simply was not captured. The June 24 aggregator page implies the docket may have reached at least ~14 entries by that date, but the "[Order on Proposed Order] (14)" string is an aggregator artifact of unknown meaning (possibly an entry-type legend with a count), and I would not assert on it that any order has issued. The honest statement is: I cannot confirm from available sources that Menards has appeared or answered. Anyone relying on this should pull the live PACER docket.

---

II. Each requested category, disposed of explicitly

Filing & initial pleadings. Complaint only (2026-04-29). No answer, no counterclaims, no third-party complaint confirmed. Given Menards' practice in the companion case — where it answered and simultaneously moved to compel arbitration within 26 days — a prompt, aggressive response (answer plus motion) would be consistent with its playbook, but nothing is confirmed here.

Pre-trial motions of substance. None. No motion to dismiss, no § 1404(a) transfer motion (note: transfer would be an uphill fight — Belwith is the plaintiff and resident in this district, and Menard litigated the companion case here without seeking transfer), no motion to stay pending IPR, no summary judgment motion. For context, the companion case supplies the only substantive motion practice in the parties' history: the denied motion to compel arbitration (2022-10-27, ECF 31) and the 2025-08-28 cross-SJ order.

Claim construction / Markman. None. The case has not reached a scheduling order, so no Markman hearing exists. Structurally: the Western District of Michigan has not adopted local patent rules, so there is no automatic LPR-driven exchange of infringement/contentions/claim-construction lists; claim construction timing will come from a case-management order. Expect a disputed term set centered on "recessed LED seat," "attachment grooves," "cover … at least partially translucent," and "decorative element" under the '718 specification (see patent text at Google Patents, FreePatentsOnline).

Discovery milestones. None. No Rule 26(f) conference, no initial disclosures, no protective order, no ESI order confirmed. Strategically, the entire prior-case discovery record (Menard's maintenance photographs, JD Sales and Centricity service records 2004–2021, the Finck deposition, the 2010 and 2016 VCPLs) is already banked and will be re-used; the new frontier is technical discovery on the accused fixtures and Menard's sourcing.

Trial, verdict, post-trial motions. None. No trial date.

Settlement/dismissal/judgment/appeal. None. No Rule 41 dismissal, no consent judgment, no appeal to the Federal Circuit (and none could exist absent

I'll research counsel of record for Belwith Products in this case.

Let me pull the docket detail and check for additional appearances.

Bottom line

Only one attorney has appeared for Belwith Products in No. 1:26-cv-01400 on the public record: Joseph M. Infante of Miller Canfield Paddock & Stone PLC's Grand Rapids office. He is the filer of the complaint and the payor of the filing fee, and no other appearance, pro hac vice motion, or in-house designation for Belwith appears in the available docket snapshots. This is a single-counsel appearance as of the latest retrievable data.

Counsel of record for Plaintiff Belwith Products, LLC

Other Belwith counsel in the earlier case (not confirmed on this docket): Christopher James Gartman entered an appearance for Belwith in No. 1:22-cv-00335 on May 10, 2022 (per the Justia docket for that case). I could not verify his current firm affiliation or whether he has appeared, or will appear, in 1:26-cv-01400 — PACER Monitor's party block for the new case lists Infante only. Treat him as a plausible second chair rather than counsel of record here.

No in-house counsel for Belwith appears in any public snapshot, and I found no motion for pro hac vice admission by any out-of-state patent firm. Menards had not appeared as of the most recent available docket snapshots (no answer, no judge assignment shown; the Ex Parte tracker still displays "Pending Judge Assignment").

Sourcing, and where the record is thin

• PACER Monitor, case 1:26-cv-01400 (W.D. Mich.), https://cdn.pacermonitor.com/public/case/64391971/Belwith_Products,_LLC_v_Menard,_Inc — party block ("Represented By: Joseph Mikhail Infante, Miller Canfield Paddock & Stone Plc (Grand Rapids)") plus docket entries: ECF No. 1, 51-page complaint with jury demand filed by Infante, 04/29/2026; filing-fee entry the same day.
• Justia dockets, NOS 830 browse page for W.D. Mich., confirming the case and § 271 cause of action but no counsel detail.
• Ex Parte / ai-lab case page, https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/dct/miwd/1:26-cv-01400/... — confirms 04/29/26 filing, "Pending Judge Assignment," and an empty-ish attorney field.
• Miller Canfield firm bio, https://www.millercanfield.com/JosephInfante (and the print-pilot PDF bio) — admissions, office address, practice description; firm press release, "Miller Canfield Elects Nine New Principals" (Mar. 6, 2014), for the IP-practice characterization.
• Justia docket, No. 1:2022cv00335, https://dockets.justia.com/docket/michigan/miwdce/1:2022cv00335/[104510](/patent/104510) — May 10, 2022 appearance of Christopher James Gartman for Belwith; May 3, 2022 appearance of Thomas G. Herman for Menard (useful for anticipating the defense side).
• CourtListener / ECF No. 128 in No. 1:22-cv-00335, https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.miwd.104510/gov.uscourts.miwd.104510.128.0.pdf — prior-case posture relied on above.

Explicit caveats. (1) The complaint (ECF No. 1) sits behind the PACER paywall; I could not read the caption block, signature block, or any pro hac vice attachments, so an additional attorney could be listed there without yet having a docketed appearance. (2) PACER Monitor's "Represented By" field is generated from docketed appearances and can lag; the page indicated a very recent refresh, so this is the best available but not a certified docket sheet — a direct PACER docket pull should be the confirming step. (3) I did not identify any prior patent case litigated by Infante by name; his verified IP-adjacent experience is the Belwith v. Laurey design-patent/copyright matter (2010) and general IP/trade-secret work, and I have not confirmed he personally handled Laurey, so I am not attributing it to him.

Watch item that bears on the earlier sections' open question. A 51-page § 271 complaint staffed (so far) by a single Grand Rapids commercial litigator with a USPTO registration, rather than by a patent trial boutique, is consistent with the theory that this case is a contract-grounded re-pleading of the VCPL dispute with a thin patent overlay — and it slightly undercuts, without refuting, the hypothesis that multiple design patents are being asserted with full claim charts. Expect a pro hac vice appearance by specialized patent counsel, or an amended complaint, before the case management conference; that filing would be the event that clarifies the asserted-patent list.

I'll search for docket appearances and counsel for Menards in this case.

Let me dig into the docket itself and check for defense appearances.

The PACER Monitor snapshot only shows plaintiff's side. Let me pull the actual docket sheet from other trackers.

Counsel of record for the defendant: what the record shows

Bottom line: as of the most recent docket snapshot I could retrieve, no attorney has entered an appearance for Menard, Inc. in No. 1:26-cv-01400, and no answer or Rule 12 response appears on the docket. I could not identify any defense counsel of record, and I am not going to name one by inference.

What the docket actually shows

The PACER Monitor public docket page for this case (cdn.pacermonitor.com/public/case/64391971) lists only one represented party and one attorney entry:

The only docket entry captured is Doc. 1 (complaint) plus its Exhibit 1 and the fee payment. There is no summons-return entry, no attorney appearance under W.D. Mich. LCivR 83.1, no corporate disclosure statement, and no answer, motion to dismiss, or extension motion reflected. The Ex Parte litigation-data page for the case likewise shows "Pending Judge Assignment" with the attorney field for the defense empty (ai-lab.exparte.com).

Important caveat on freshness. The PACER Monitor snapshot's "last checked" stamp reads 29, 2026 and the page reports "docket last updated: 3 hours ago," which places the snapshot in late May 2026, roughly a month after the April 29, 2026 filing — not today's date of October 26, 2026. A parallel index entry at open-public-records.com claims an indexing date of June 24, 2026 and references an "[Order on Proposed Order]" docket line, but that site's content is generic scraped text and I could not verify that entry, nor reconcile it with a docket that otherwise shows no motion practice. So: the absence of defense counsel is confirmed only through approximately late May 2026. Given that nearly six months have elapsed, it is entirely possible — indeed likely, if the case is being litigated — that appearances and a responsive pleading have been filed since that snapshot. This needs to be re-run against the live PACER docket; I could not reach a current docket sheet through the tools available.

Why the silence is plausible rather than surprising

Two structural features make an empty defense side unremarkable at this snapshot date. First, service: Menard is a Wisconsin corporation with no registered agent in the Western District of Michigan, so there would have been a waiver-of-service or formal service sequence that takes weeks after filing. Second, the case still shows no judge assignment, which is consistent with an early-stage docket in this district. Neither point proves nothing has been filed since May; they only explain why nothing appeared in the first month.

Candidates from Menard's actual litigation history — leads, not counsel of record

To be unambiguous: none of the following is counsel of record in No. 1:26-cv-01400, and none should be reported as such. These are attorneys documented as representing Menard in other matters, useful only as names to check against the live docket:

• Thomas G. Herman — entered his appearance for Menard in the immediately preceding case, Belwith Prods., LLC v. Menard, Inc., No. 1:22-cv-00335 (W.D. Mich.), on May 3, 2022, per the Justia docket for that case (dockets.justia.com). He is the single most likely candidate by continuity, given that the '718 suit re-pleads the same VCPL/display-cabinet grievance — but I could not confirm his firm from these sources and will not guess at it.
• Charles Johnson Meyer — appeared for Menard in SemiLED Innovations LLC v. Menard, Inc., No. 3:24-cv-00099 (W.D. Wis.), filing an extension motion and a joint motion to stay pending settlement (Dkt. 29, 32), per UniCourt. This is the firm/attorney who has handled Menard's more recent patent defense docket in Wisconsin.
• Konrad Sherinian (Sherinian Law, Naperville, Illinois) — his firm's own representative-cases page states he "defended Menards against an accusation of patent infringement" in Tecmen Electronics v. Menard (2016), settled shortly after filing (sherinianlaw.net).
• Menard's in-house legal department (Eau Claire, Wisconsin) — the Signify litigation record refers to "Menard's litigation and corporate counsel" providing sworn testimony, indicating an active in-house function that would likely supervise any outside patent counsel engaged here. No individual in-house attorney is named in any source I found.

One name I deliberately exclude: Henrik Villumsen (Villumsen Law Firm), who appears in EdisonReport's coverage of Signify N. Am. Corp. v. Menard, No. 3:22-cv-00706 (W.D. Wis.), is quoted as a commentator and appears connected to third-party defendants, not established as Menard's own counsel. I would not list him without confirmation.

Where this fits the case posture already described

The earlier sections flagged that the answer, counterclaims, and Menards' counsel were all unconfirmed. That remains exactly the state of the record: the defendant's side of the docket is blank through the last retrievable snapshot. Practically, the identity of Menard's counsel is worth tracking because of the strategic point already noted — the Signify case shows Menard's patent-defense playbook is to (i) bring third-party manufacturers in for indemnity and (ii) pursue IPR stays. If the same Wisconsin counsel (Meyer) appears here rather than West Michigan local counsel, that is an early signal Menards intends to run an invalidity/IPR-and-indemnity strategy against '718 rather than a purely local contract-flavored defense.

How to confirm (recommended next step)

Pull the live docket for Case No. 1:26-cv-01400 on PACER (or CourtListener's RECAP mirror, which for this district uses the gov.uscourts.miwd prefix) and read every entry after Doc. 1. Look specifically for: (1) non-document "ATTORNEY APPEARANCE" entries, which in this district generate text-only docket lines naming the attorney and firm exactly as in the 2022 case; (2) a Rule 7.1 corporate disclosure statement for Menard; and (3) the answer/counterclaim, which under the local rules would also reveal whether Menards pleads ownership or inventorship defenses tied to the display cabinets. Also check whether a judge has since been assigned (Judge Phillip J. Green and Judge Paul L. Maloney handled the 2022 case), since assignment often coincides with the first substantive defense filing.

Sourcing confidence: high confidence that no defense appearance existed as of late May 2026 (direct docket read); no confidence about the current state of the record as of October 26, 2026. I found no Law360 or Reuters Legal item naming Menard's counsel in this case, and the complaint itself (behind the PACER paywall) would not name opposing counsel in any event.