A WORLD-beating slime brand in Blackburn has successfully ordered a Swedish rival to take a copycat product off the market.

Gladstone Road-based Zimpli Kids are behind such best-selling lines as Slime Baff and Gelli Baff, perhaps two of the top trending playthings of Christmas 2018.

But their runaway success - which includes amassing a YouTube audience topping six billion viewers - has come at a cost.

In the opening 24 hours of a Nuremberg toy fair, Zimpli officials discovered another slime bath product, which they believed infringed their global patents.

Swedish outfit Robetoy, the firm responsible, was served with an immediate ‘cease and desist’ order by their lawyers.

And within a day Robetoy, based near Gothenburg, had agreed to remove the offending product from the show and pay a lump sum towards Zimpli’s legal costs.

Eejay Enyi. Zimpli’s sales director, said: “Zimpli Kids own substantial intellectual property, trademark and patent rights worldwide on our two core brands, Gelli Baff and Slime Baff, and we will aggressively defend these rights in every jurisdiction in the world.

“We issued the cease and desist notification so as to stop Robetoy from offering infringing product at the show.

“Robetoy agreed within 24 hours to remove the infringing product from the show and pay us a lump sum to offset our legal fees.”

Company insiders say that their track record has led to a number of would-be imitators and their legal team will not hesitate to launch similar actions in future.

Other cases have been taken out involving copyright infringement in Australia and France, bosses have confirmed.

Zimpli, which is part of European brand Simba Toys, started out in Great Harwood before relocating to Blackburn.

Several leading online toy reviewers have supported their range, making them a YouTube mainstay, with youngsters and their parents, across a number of channels.

An average of 5.1million views are notched up for their product lines every single day, latest figures have revealed.

Earlier last year Zimpli brought the bulk of its manufacturing in-house, and say only their Slime Blaster and inflatable products are now made in China.

The company has also pledged to only employ recycled materials in its packaging and display units.