{3:30 minutes to read} The more distinctive a trademark is, the broader and stronger rights the owner will have in that trademark. But not every company chooses a distinctive name. Oftentimes businesses want the company name to describe what the company does so that consumers viewing the name will have an immediate understanding of the nature or a feature of a product or service. So for example, Salty as the name of a salty snack product. A name that describes...
{2 minutes to read} When selecting a new name for a business, product, or service, one of the first steps should be a trademark availability search to look for potentially “confusingly similar” trademarks that could block the registration of your trademark. Ideally, the next step would be to file a trademark application with the US Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) to preserve your rights to the name. If you allow too much time to pass between conducting the search and...
{3:00 minutes to read} Approximately four to five months after you file a trademark application, an examining attorney for the US Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) will review the application to make sure it conforms to the PTO standards and that the mark you're applying for is eligible for registration. If there are any problems with the application, the examining attorney will issue an Office Action. Trademark owners then have six months to respond to that Office Action. If no...
