We’ve had a number of trademark enquiries lately along the lines of “I’ve registered the company at Companies House and I’ve bought the domains and I wondered about getting a trademark”, followed by “Why are you telling me there’s a problem?”. Or worse, “I’ve just received this..”. The problem is usually (a) that someone else has already registered the same or similar trademark, or (b) that the name is not a trademark, just a product or service description.
When choosing a new business name, most people’s first thought is to choose a name that tells the potential customer what they do or what they sell, or something close to that. But that isn’t really a trademark – it’s a product or service description and you cannot expect to obtain exclusive rights to it. Read more