Taco Bell failed to pay the men who pitched the idea of the Taco Bell Chihuahua and later were court ordered to pay $42.1 million dollars.

In 2003, Taco Bell lost a lawsuit by two Michigan men, who had pitched the concept of the Chihuahua to Taco Bell six years earlier at a Licensing Show in NYC. Taco Bell worked with Thomas Rinks and Joseph Shields for over a year developing the Chihuahua campaign and commercials, but TB failed to pay the men according to court documents.