Köehler Books announced this month that it is shutting down the North American Stories short story writing contest, effective January 22, 2012.

This action is based primarily to two reasons:

1) Lack of sufficient submissions to sustain the contest, according to the rules.

2) Being forced to change the name from America’s Got Stories to another name.

“We had successfully completed the first contest,” says publisher John Koehler. “The America’s Got Stories brand was working, and we received over 130 entries from which we published a book, America’s Got Stories, Volume One. We had a head of steam and were achieving critical mass.”

Things went so well in fact, that Koehler planned on developing a separate contest for kids and young adults, called Young America’s Got Stories. Then he received a cease and desist letter from the law firm for Fremantle North America, which produces the well-known TV show, America’s Got Talent.

“It was a trademark infringement claim,” says Koehler. “The rule is that if the public is confused by the similar name or mark, they have a claim. So even though our name is different, the fact that it begins with “America’s Got” can lead to confusion. We aren’t even related to TV and no one ever asked if we were related to the TV show, but we had to back down.They are huge and we’re small. They have deep pockets and we don’t.”

While his publishing company is shutting down this contest, Koehler expects and hopes they will continue to work with the writing community in various new and unusual ways in the future.

“Our goal was to give writers a chance to be read and published. To count. We did that. We will continue to do that.”