We Protect the Brands That Power Growing Businesses.

A trademark is a word, name, symbol, logo, slogan, color, sound, or combination of these things that identifies the source of goods or services in the marketplace and distinguishes them from competitors. Anything that consumers use to recognize who is selling can function as a trademark — and the law protects that recognition so customers aren’t deceived about who they’re buying from.

A clearance search is a comprehensive investigation conducted before filing to identify federal registrations, pending applications, common law uses, and foreign marks with U.S. rights that might conflict with your proposed mark. A professional search covers federal, state, and common law sources, plus phonetic and visual variants the USPTO will treat as confusingly similar under Section 2(d). For a six- or seven-figure rebrand decision, a thorough clearance is cheap insurance. The cost of skipping it — a 2(d) refusal at examination, a cease-and-desist after launch, or worst case an injunction — typically runs 50× to 100× more than the search would have cost.

An Office Action is a written communication from the USPTO examining attorney explaining grounds for refusal or requesting additional information. The initial deadline to respond is three months from issue (extendable to six on payment of a fee). Common grounds include likelihood of confusion (Section 2(d)), descriptiveness (Section 2(e)), specimen rejection, and identification-of-goods clarification. Office Action responses are technical specialist work — a generalist response often makes the situation worse by creating prosecution-history estoppel that limits how the registration can be enforced later.

Section 2(d) prohibits registration of a mark that is likely to be confused with an already-registered or earlier-filed mark. It is the most common substantive refusal in USPTO examination. The examiner applies the 13-factor DuPont test, weighing the similarity of the marks, the relatedness of the goods or services, the channels of trade, the strength of the cited mark, evidence of actual confusion, and other factors. A successful response requires building the right factual record — distinguishing the marks, narrowing the identification of goods, attacking the cited mark’s coverage, or in some cases negotiating a consent agreement with the cited owner.

A federal trademark registration can last indefinitely — but only if the owner files required maintenance documents on schedule. Between years 5 and 6 after registration: a Section 8 Declaration of Continued Use must be filed, or the registration is cancelled. Between years 9 and 10 (and every 10 years thereafter): a Section 8 Declaration plus a Section 9 Renewal. Missing a deadline is a hard cancellation — there is a six-month grace window with surcharge, but no revival once that closes. For portfolios above 20 marks, a docket-management system or outside-counsel calendaring is essential. We see at least one cancelled-by-missed-Section-8 in nearly every portfolio audit we run.

Yes, but a trademark license must include genuine quality control provisions. U.S. law requires that a licensor maintain actual control over the nature and quality of the goods or services offered by the licensee. A “naked license” — one without real quality control — can result in abandonment of the licensor’s trademark rights, voiding the registration. Standard provisions include approval rights over the licensee’s products, services, marketing materials, and use of the mark; periodic inspection or audit rights; and a termination trigger for material quality breaches.

A C&D letter is a demand, not a court order. You are not legally compelled to stop immediately. Four response paths: (1) Compliance — cease use within a negotiated timeline and document the resolution. (2) Negotiation — coexistence or consent agreement if the markets can be carved. (3) Defense — respond with the legal and factual basis: priority of use, lack of confusion, descriptiveness, fair use, or other defenses. (4) Pre-emption — file a declaratory-judgment action in your preferred forum to choose the venue. Ignoring the letter is almost never sound strategy: it accelerates the sender’s path to suit and forecloses negotiated resolution.

Federal trademark remedies include: injunctive relief (court order stopping the conduct); disgorgement of the infringer’s profits; actual damages; treble damages in exceptional cases; attorneys’ fees in exceptional cases; statutory damages in counterfeiting cases. For registered marks, you can also record the registration with U.S. Customs to block infringing imports at the border, and use the UDRP to recover bad-faith domain registrations. Practical recovery depends on the strength of the federal registration, documented evidence of consumer confusion, and the financial position of the infringer.