Trademarking

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VRT Southend Vulcan
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Trademarking

Post by VRT Southend Vulcan »

There was a thread on here a few months ago about trademarking, more specifically about how a company had been able to trademark the term Remove Before Flight and gain exclusive rights to sell key rings and tags etc. bearing that term. This was despite such items having been sold by all and sundry for donkey’s years.

I’ve searched for the thread but can’t find it, hence this new one. If anyone whose search skills are better than mine can let me know where it is, I’ll gladly move this post!

Having recently gone through the process of trademarking some terms and designs on behalf of the Vulcan Restoration Trust, Id like to make a comment about how the position with Remove Before Flight might possibly have arisen, which might be useful to anyone else involved in running an aviation charity or aviation-related small business.

Firstly, though, I would say that the staff at the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) who deal with trademarking applications are a pleasure to deal with and are always very happy to discuss any issues and concerns you might have. So what I say here is not a criticism of them as individuals but about the process they operate as a body.

It was clear to me as I went through the process that the IPO don’t make any checks to see if the applicant has any ownership or claim of any kind over the design or term they’re applying to trademark. The IPO is very hot checking if what you’re applying for might already be trademarked, or might be considered similar to something already trademarked. Its process, though, does not check to see if an application is for something you ‘own’ or indeed if it’s for something already in common usage or something already used by others.

Hence, in the case of Remove Before Flight, I can well imagine the IPO doing thorough checks to establish if the term was already covered by a trademark, but not doing any checks to find out if it was exclusive to the applicant. In the case in question, a quick search on Google would have established that Remove Before Flight items were already being sold by several suppliers. This would have given the IPO grounds to question the applicant as to whether it had a genuine claim over the term.

I find the IPO’s approach very strange. The purpose of trademarking is to protect designs and terms individuals and organisations have spent time and money creating from exploitation by others for their own commercial gain. It’s not to provide a vehicle for organisations to ‘grab’ ownership of existing designs and terms and create a monopoly for themselves in what is already a competitive market. The IPO’s process achieves its aim, but by not checking doesn’t to see if an applicant has any genuine claim or ownership over the subject of its application, it leaves the door wide open for any individual or organisation to trademark a design or term that’s already in common usage.

The IPO does publish a list each month on the Gov.uk website of all the applications it’s received and there is a process for anyone to object to an application. The IPO would likely argue this provides a mechanism through which any attempt to trademark a commonly-used term will be spotted. However, the reality is that, aside from large companies with the resource to check through the list each month for an application that might compromise their business, Joe Public or Joanne Small Company does not have the time to continually keep an eye out for one that might affect theirs.

Rich

Richard Clarkson
Trustee
Vulcan Restoration Trust
Preserving Vulcan XL426 at London Southend Airport
Registered Charity No 1058111

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NAM Updater
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Re: Trademarking

Post by NAM Updater »

You may find that the thread was lost in the backup situation a few months ago.

One of the key things to consider with patents / trademarking is something known as Prior Art. Several years ago (1990s) the company I worked for fought and won a patent situation on the design of some weighing equipment by using photographic and drawing evidence from the 1950s - I spent hours going through the company archive to find several site installation photographs showing a similar design of weigher that a company from Switzerland was trying to enforce a patent over.

Some interesting guidance and background in here: https://www.epo.org/learning/materials/ ... r-art.html

Similarly, I have signed numerous affidavits to say that wording in company brochures was written by me as part of copyright / trademark cases; where other companies we copying and reproducing that text. I've also tracked down many professional photographers who did work for the company, and whose copyright was also being infringed, and they also had to sign similar affidavits.

Happy for you to email me if you want to chat about any specifics.
Howard Heeley - Newark Air Museum Trustee
Every museum visit counts!
http://newarkairmuseum.org

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