Fast, Easy, and Affordable Trademark Searches
In the trademark world, the recent buss is Anheuser-Busch’s creative demand letter it sent to a Minnesota craft brewery. If you have not heard the story, the Minnesota brewery advertised a beer call DILLY DILLY. Rather than send a nasty letter written by a lawyer, Anheuser-Busch sent a medieval dressed man with a scroll to …
Continue reading “Why the Intent-to-Use Trademark Application is A Game Changer”
You use BOB to conduct a trademark search and you get a yellow light. If you received a yellow light instead of a red light, that means you may be closer to the registration you are looking for than you think. But you are not out of the wood and there may be an issue …
Continue reading “2 Things to Check When Your Search Results Returns a Yellow Light”
Let’s assume you have used BOB to conduct a trademark search, and BOB returns a red light with a warning about the mark you searched. Is that the end of the story or is there something you can do? The answer is, there may be something you can do. Here are the five things to …
Continue reading “5 Things to Check When Your Trademark Search Returns a Red Light”
In Alfwear Inc. v. Shuff, the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board found that bicycles and clothing are related goods. The Board held that outdoor clothing and bicycles are not related because the goods can be used together. The said that “consumers generally war clothing in connection with most activities.” “[T]he test is not that goods …
Most companies have their primary trademark and a slogan. If you talk to a trademark attorney, the primary trademark should be the thing where the goodwill is acquired and the slogan is like marketing collateral used to build the goodwill in the primary brand. In other words, the primary mark ideally is inherently distinctive whereas …
Price Rite Marketplace recently announced a rebranding effort that will include the introduction of private label products. Price Rite is a grocery store with locations on the East Coast. Expanding the use of a mark to new goods or services is not automatic. No one owns a trademark in gross, meaning for every good or …
Continue reading “Expanding Product Lines: Remember to Search First”
Trademark searching is part of any naming project. It is an important part of a naming project too because although namers are not trademark attorneys, if a branding firm can avoid getting a client’s hopes up on a particular name, that’s a good thing. Here are five reasons why trademark search software, and BOB in …
Continue reading “5 Ways Trademark Search Software Can Benefit Branding Companies”
As we discussed in a previous posts, the similarity of the marks is evaluated in terms of sight, sound, and meaning to arrive at a determination of whether the two marks at issue create similar, overall commercial impressions. From an evidentiary perspective, parties will count letters, syllables, and even engage linguists to opine on the …
Continue reading “Extrinsic Evidence of Mark Similarity, Sometimes, But Not Always, Welcome”
The Trademark Office Database is littered with abandoned applications and registrations. In the Trademark Office Database these abandoned applications are registrations are marked at “dead.” An application can be abandoned for any number of reasons, but the most common reasons are: (1) failure to file a response to an office action; (2) failure to timely …
Coach has been the most active trademark owner in terms of number of lawsuits filed for the past nine years according to Lex Machina’s third Trademark Litigation Report. From 2009 to October 2017, Coach has filed 758 lawsuits. The top ten filers for the same period are: Chanel, Sream, Microsoft, American Automobile Association, Deckers Outdoor …
Continue reading “Coach Nabs the Top Spot in 2017 for the top US Trademark Litigation Filer”