Trademarks

I posted a short quote on our facebook group:

''The consequences of not registering a trade mark can be devastating for a brand, if someone else applies for your name they can stop you using it. Angels will be unlikely to risk their hard-earned cash with a business that has no protection whatsoever. Many businesses mistakenly think that having their business name registered at Companies House provides them with protection. It doesn’t, and neither does owning the internet domain or their Limited Company name.''

I was quite surprised at the attention this received with my fellow wonderful women. It seems this is an area that many of us need to explore further.

Now, I am no expert. But before I get all of my cosmetics made and shipped over, I wanted to make sure no one could come along and stop  me using my name, or stop me selling my product.

I headed over to http://www.ipo.gov.uk/tm.htm and read their guides. It seems that many people believe that having a limited company (and therefore being registered at Companies House) or owning a domain name is enough to lay claim to their business name. This is simply not true. I suppose it up to you to decide how important your branding is to you.

I adore my name, and found it hard to believe no one else had used it yet, but I hadn't found anything. I own the domain, and would hate for someone else to trademark it and then demand I stop using it.

So I bit the bullet and applied to the IPO to trademark it. You can use lawyers, as it can be a complicated area, depending on what you sell, and your name, but I need to keep costs down. It costs £200 to file it yourself.

You have to decide what 'class' your product or service will come under, and each class costs an additional £50. However it does say you may not be able to add to this later, I'm sure there must be ways to do this, but not sure! As I said I'm no expert.

You submit the payment, and they then search their databases, to see if any trademark exists with the same, or similar, name exists. If they accept that your name seems clear it gets published in their journal and there is two months for anyone to challenge it. If no challenge is made, the trademark is yours. The £200 is paying for the searching, so if it is rejected at any point you do not get a refund.

I had the good news today that they have had a clear search, and they will be publishing it in their journal, so I now have the two month wait.

Also remember that this only covers the UK, and to cover other areas is quite costly and complicated. If you need to cover areas, I would imagine a lawyer would be a good idea.

So it may be something to look into, even if you decide you don't need to do it.