The non-compete was still ticking when she signed with a competitor
A bridal dress sales rep has lost a $40,000 commission fight after jumping to a competitor just days too soon.
The Appellate Court of Illinois on October 19, 2026, affirmed judgment for Jasmine Enterprises Incorporated, a bridal wear distributor, finding the representative breached a non-compete clause before her resignation took effect - and that a contractual provision stripping her commissions was valid.
The representative worked under a 2019 agreement giving her exclusive rights to sell the company’s bridal, bridesmaid, and mother-of-bride dresses across an assigned territory at a 7.5 percent commission on shipped orders. The agreement barred her from selling competing products during the contract term. Breach the non-compete and the agreement would terminate immediately, with all outstanding commissions forfeited as liquidated damages - a pre-agreed measure of loss where actual damages are hard to calculate.
On April 21, 2022, she emailed her resignation, effective May 22. Five days later, she found herself locked out of the company’s computer system. She took that as a termination and, on April 27, signed with Morilee, a direct competitor selling identical products.
The company saw it differently. The trial court found she failed to prove the lockout amounted to a discharge. That left her bound by the non-compete when she signed with the rival - breaching it “by approximately April 28th at the latest,” as the court put it.
She sued under the Illinois Sales Representative Act, which requires principals to pay all commissions due within 13 days of termination. Her argument: once commissions are earned, a private agreement cannot claw them back.
The appellate court disagreed. It held the Act requires payment of commissions “due at the time of termination” - and the forfeiture clause meant none were due. The clause did not waive the Act’s protections; it ensured there was nothing left to protect.
The court also upheld the liquidated damages clause, noting the company’s officers both testified - without meaningful contradiction - that calculating actual damages from a non-compete breach would be difficult given variables like timing within the selling season and customer confusion in a small industry where competitors sold identical products.
She had read the agreement before signing, negotiated other terms, and left the non-compete and forfeiture clauses unchanged.
For HR teams managing commission-based relationships, the ruling shows a well-drafted forfeiture clause tied to a non-compete breach can survive statutory commission-protection challenges - so long as it extinguishes the entitlement before termination rather than clawing it back after.
The appellate court affirmed the trial court’s judgment in full.
