What are the implications of a successfully registered trademark via the state of Montana or Federal?

If your trade area and customers are strictly located within Montana and you will not be selling products online, then a state trademark application may be fine.

In most other circumstances, however, federal applications are often pursued because they offer broader coverage and other benefits. For example, you will want a federal registration if you sell outside of Montana, including online sales.

In addition, if you want to file a trademark with the state of Montana, you must be using your mark in the state at the time of filing. A federal filing, on the other hand, may generally be based on a good faith intent to use the mark in the future. (A registration typically cannot issue until the mark is in use.)

Some other key benefits of federal registrations include: (1) presumed nationwide validity once the registration issues; (2) notice to third parties because the mark will appear in the USPTO database; (3) ability to use the ® symbol once the mark is registered; (4) presumption of validity of the trademark if you have to enforce your rights in court; (5) the ability to exclude infringing imports by recording the trademark registration with U.S. Customs; (6) evidence of trademark rights in proceedings against cybersquatters; and (7) advantages in filing foreign trademarks. As a result, you may see increased value of the business in which the trademark is used; and you may be able to use your federal trademark as an additional source of collateral if your company requires financing.

Note that companies interested in filing for state trademark protection will want to search the USPTO database for similar trademarks prior to filing with the state.

Jeremy Brown

Dorsey & Whitney Missoula

http://www.dorsey.com/brown_jeremy/

P: (406) 329-5575

[email protected]