Typically, filed trademarks are examined by an examiner with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) within 12 weeks of filing; however, a backlog of trademarks developed during Covid and we are seeing waits of six to seven months on newly filed trademarks until examined. Once the trademark is examined and approved, it must publish in the Gazette for 30 days to give any other party a chance to oppose it. Approximately 11 weeks after publishing, your trademark should formally issue. There is no way to speed up this process, but bear in mind that once your trademark is filed, your rights are locked in and another party cannot leapfrog you with the same trademark at the USPTO.

Intent-to-use applications, or 1B applications, are trademark filings on a mark which is not yet in use but which the owner intends to start using soon. The effect of filing an intent-to-use application is essentially the same as filing an application for a trademark which is in use — namely that your rights are locked in and nobody else can take the trademark from you so long as it is allowed by the USPTO and you start using the mark within the alloted time period. This period is six months after the trademark is examined, published and allowed — or approximately 12 months from the time the trademark is filed. This time period can be extended for up to two years with payment of an extension fee. Additionally, on 1B intent-to-use applications, when you start using the trademark, we have to file a statement of use (SOU), which is simply a photograph of the trademarking being used. There is a $100 filing fee which must be paid to the USPTO upon filing the SOU. We charge an additional $80 in attorney fees to file the SOU when use commences.

We will handle that for you once we have your completed questionaire HERE. We will determine whether you need a word mark (i.e., a trademark covering a name) or a stylized mark (i.e., a trademark covering a logo). We will call you and discuss it briefly before filing. From your product description, we will carefully pick the class into which we thing you should go. With the Preferred Package, before filing, we will conduct a cursory trademark clearance seach to determine if there are any other obvious marks we could present a problem and notify you of any problems we see.

Yes, we certainly do. If you represent a business out of the United States who needs trademark assistance protecting a trademark within the United States, please contact us via phone at 888-941-9933 or email at info@westernip.com, and we will help you immediately. For international clients, we need to take your information over the phone or email as the order form on this site is not always suffient.

Brand owners often are making use of both the name of their brand and a logo associated with it. We recommend you trademark both. If you can only afford a single trademark, we typically recommend that you file a word mark on the brand name unless there are potential problems with trademarking the brand name (such as the brand name being descriptive, geographically descriptive, generic, or potentially in conflict with another mark). In those cases, it may be best to trademark the logo (i.e., a stylized mark). There order form we have online provides the ability for you to choose whether to file a word mark or stylized mark.

We can help you with office actions on pending trademark application and appear as your attorney of record in the application. We typically charge about $320 to handle an office action response, though it may be less or more depending on the complexity of the response which is needed.

Please email us or call us. We are happy to speak with you or respond to questions quickly. Our phone number is 888-941-9933. Please choose the “new client” option from the main menu when calling. Our email is: info@westernip.com

We file all trademarks submitted via our electronic submission form either the same day received, or within one business day, including filing trademarks are Saturday and the weekends. We file through the USPTO’s online portal.

Once filed, your trademark is then pending and your rights are locked in. It then goes into a queue at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for three to seven months. It is thereafter examined, at which time the USPTO may send one or more office actions to use asking we correct or modify the mark. We do so without additiona charge to you under the Preferred Package. Under the Basic Package, we handle the responses if they are minor. Either way we will email you about them. One examination is complete, you have your registration certificate and our work is done.

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