Competitor Went Behind My Back And Spoke About Me To Our (mutual) Manufacturer - Could This Be Tortious Interference?

Would this qualify as tortious interference? I don’t even want to get my hopes up if this is dead in the water.

location: Missouri

I just started a small retail business on Thursday. I had spent months developing tech packs, designing, and corresponding with my manufacturer.

On Thursday morning, just hours before opening, a super popular player in the retail clothing business reached out to me via pm. To say I was shocked, is an understatement. They accused me of stealing their “signature silhouette”. I explained that I was given this silhouette by the manufacturer themselves, that many other shops sell dresses with the same design, and that anyone can log on to Alibaba and have a dress made in this shape, perfectly legally.

They weren’t hearing it. I didn’t reply to them for a couple of days, but finally on Sunday I offered a conference call to hopefully “humanize” the situation. They declined. They also posted in their own FB group about how the silhouette is “truly ours” and how they built it “from the ground up.” Finally, they actually sent me screenshots of correspondence with their/our manufacturer. I know we use the same manufacturer because they are advertised on their page under “Our Clients.” Those screenshots showed that they had been talking about me and that the manufacturer was sharing my account info with them (even though it wasn’t accurate).

I’d like to add that my manufacturer and I also have a signed non-disclosure/non-use/non-circumvention agreement. So the manufacturer isn’t allowed to talk about my account to other clients. All of these obligations survive termination of our business agreement, too.

Soooo, fast forward to this morning, Monday. I wake up to a flood of refund notifications from Alibaba. The manufacturer tells me that they are not able to produce any of my stuff moving forward. No word on what happened to my samples. No other explanation. All four days after I opened on Thursday!!

I had to write a humiliating post on facebook explaining that my manufacturer dropped me. And of course, I had to refund the thousands of dollars in orders I received over opening weekend :-( I am absolutely devastated. If it matters, I haven’t been able to find another manufacturer to make these dresses to the quality/standard this one can. No manufacturer even comes close. it takes a certain level of skill to make this type of dress look good.

I’m not looking for false reassurance but the timeline is really clear here. If it were able to be proven that this company intentionally pressured or induced my manufacturer to terminate its business relationship with me, would that potentially constitute tortious interference under Missouri law?