Posts Tagged: "brands"

Brands — legally protected as trademarks — have value. We all understand that intuitively. Registering brands as federal trademarks also provides significant legal benefits, such as the presumption of ownership, validity, and nationwide priority in the mark. According to a recent study, the number of trademarks a company registers in a given year helps predict that company’s profitability and stock returns for the following year.

Protecting brands and going after counterfeiters is like herding cats. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of ways that online counterfeiters illegally monetize brands. Companies have many ways to combat them, but it can traditionally take lots of time, cost, and resources to do it. Now there is a less publicized option in the United States which can deter counterfeiters, takes little time, and often even pays for itself. This ultimately can result in true deterrence of counterfeiters for a brand in online marketplaces. With online sales exploding, there has been a marked increase in sales of counterfeit products, despite various solutions available to combat it. Indeed, the industry as a whole will see over $1.7 trillion of sold counterfeit products on various online platforms each year—and that estimate, by the International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition, was in 2015. Counterfeit sales result in the loss of millions of U.S. jobs and lost profits, and is by far the world’s largest criminal enterprise, with eCommerce counterfeit sales expected to grow to $6 trillion by 2024 in the United States alone. 

International cosmetics retailer Sephora has agreed to pay $1.2 million to settle allegations that the company failed to cure violations of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). The settlement is the first CCPA enforcement action resulting in financial penalties from the California Attorney General’s office and elucidates the Attorney General’s view of how the use of website analytics and advertising trackers involve “sales” of personal information.

The metaverse is commonly known as “a collective virtual shared space, created by the convergence of virtually enhanced physical reality and physically persistent virtual space, including the sum of all virtual worlds, augmented reality, and the Internet.” The metaverse may eventually provide a three-dimensional or virtual world for users to shop, play games, travel, learn, socialize, work, compete, or otherwise experience life in a virtual environment. Users may eventually visit the metaverse for an activity or even choose to live much of their life in this virtual world.

Name, Image, and Likeness, or “NIL,” is the buzz word spinning around college athletics. In July 2021, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) adopted its Interim NIL Policy (“the Policy”) which allows, for the first time, student athletes to monetize their NIL rights without losing scholarships or eligibility. Fans love college sports and cheering on athletes who play for their alma mater or favorite school teams, which creates collaboration opportunities for athletes and brands alike. In an attempt to connect their products and services with college athletes—who are the face of a billion-dollar industry—brands are jumping on the college-athlete bandwagon.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) recently took a step toward letting student athletes “benefit” from use of their name, image, and likeness. The move comes after California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law a Fair Pay to Play Act allowing collegiate athletes in the Golden State to accept endorsement deals once the law takes effect in January 2023. On Tuesday, October 29, the NCAA’s Board of Governors voted “unanimously to permit students participating in athletics the opportunity to benefit from the use of their name, image, and likeness in a manner consistent with the collegiate model.” The key phrase here is “in a manner consistent with the collegiate model,” which invokes the NCAA’s commitment to the nebulous tenet of “amateurism.” Pragmatically, this vote amounts to two things for student athletes. First, this process will not happen immediately: the Board set a deadline of January 2021 for changing the rules. Second, and most notably, the Board carefully refused to acknowledge or confirm that student athletes would actually be paid. In other words, this vote is merely a shuffle in the direction of college athlete compensation by way of their “right of publicity.”

As a branding and marketing professional, I really enjoy seeing how advertising has evolved over the years. Gone are the days of boring, ho-hum advertising campaigns. With modern technology such as DVRs, consumers no longer have to sit through commercials, if they don’t want to. Through the widespread reach of the Internet and social media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook, not to mention the ever popular, highly anticipated and super expensive Super Bowl commercials, advertising campaigns have had to become more creative and fun to catch the attention of their target consumers. Now more than ever, I find that, not only are people not fast forwarding through commercials, but they are looking forward to when their favorites air, so they can share them with others. At least that’s how it is in the Quinn household! Quite some time ago, I wrote about The Most Notable, and Sometimes Creepy, Restaurant Mascots, Characters, and Personalities. So, this time I thought I’d focus on a different type of Brand Mascot, aka real people, and highlight the top five advertising personalities within the insurance service industry. Not only are these brand personalities played by real people, but they have story lines that are so funny and memorable that you often hear people talking about them with their friends. Again, I know we do in my family. So, without further ado, here are my choices for some of the most creative, memorable and often downright comedic insurance company brand personalities, both old and new.

On February 1, Amazon.com, Inc. filed a Form 10-K annual report with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Along with reporting its year-end earnings for the 2018 fiscal year, this particular SEC filing was notable because Amazon officially acknowledged to shareholders that the company’s online sales platforms face the risk of being found liable for fraudulent or unlawful activities of sellers on those platforms. This includes the company’s first-ever concession that Amazon may be unable to prevent sellers trafficking counterfeit and pirated goods. “The law relating to the liability of online service providers is currently unsettled,” Amazon’s Form 10-K filing reads. Along with the specter of counterfeit sales, Amazon noted that its seller programs may render the company unable to stop sellers from collecting payments when buyers never receive products they ordered or when products received by buyers are materially different than the sellers’ description of those products at the point of purchase. While information regarding a corporation’s potential risk of liability is a regular feature of SEC filings, news reports indicate that this is the first time that Amazon used the word “counterfeit” in an annual report.

Black Friday is one of the most important retail events of the year for brands and consumers alike. This sales event is particularly tempting for price-centric Millennials whose diverse buying habits put them at increased risk of falling for fakes. Representing one of the biggest Black Friday consumer segments, they are particularly vulnerable to counterfeiters. Last year alone, our data show that an estimated $482 million were lost on Black Friday from Millennials who unwittingly bought fakes online.

Although running an early-stage startup is exhilarating, do not let your brand name protection be swallowed up by all the excitement. Neglecting to properly secure a trademark for your company and products can lead to expensive consequences in the future, such as being forced to rebrand just as you’re gaining traction or being unable to stop infringers from using your brand name. Below are 5 of the most common mistakes businesses make with trademarks and what you can do to avoid them.

A well-devised intellectual property (IP) portfolio can go a long way to ensure a startup biotech company’s business success in the marketplace. Patents allow a patent holder to exclude others from making, using, offering to sell, selling or importing a similar product based on what is claimed in the patent while the patent is in force (35 U.S.C. 154). Biotech startups generally invest in utility patents to protect core inventions and serve as barriers to entry against competitors. When faced with budget constraints, biotech startups can tap into less expensive IP protection options to boost market position, drive up value, attract venture capital funds and generate revenue, including cross-licensing and/or settlement agreements.

Trademarks protect distinctive marks, such as brand names, logos, and designs.  This protection allows a trademark holder to exclude others from using the mark without permission of the owner. The following includes important, basic information about trademarks, as well as how start-ups can protect their trademarked intellectual property.

Managing international trademark portfolios in the age of globalization can be a fickle endeavor.  Ecommerce has blown the top off traditional thinking as it relates not only to advising your clients on what and where to file, but also how to strategically maintain those filings in the face of an increasingly crowded and adversarial global marketplace.  When a brand attempts to gain a foothold with an emerging clientele, fortune tends to favor the strategically bold.  For this reason, companies are often trying to establish their IP rights in countries where actual use or implementation may not be in the cards for years.  In the case of trademarks, the benefits are obvious: if/when a product is launched, a service begins, or a brand is introduced, a strong and enforceable portfolio is waiting to greet and protect it.  However, in jurisdictions around the world, such a strategy leaves open the possibility of an attack on these rights, most commonly in the form of a non-use cancellation action. 

The rate of digital transformation within the business world is unstoppable. Of course, transformation of this kind can deliver numerous benefits, but it is also leading to an increase in illicit counterfeit activity. Almost half (47%) of all brands are losing revenue due to counterfeiting while four out often organizations have experienced an increase in the occurrence of counterfeiting and brand infringement. This has, more often than not, originated from a variety of components related to digital transformation on a global scale, including but not being limited to: advances in social media (61%); chat/messaging (52%); artificial intelligence (51%); the dark web (48%), and augmented reality (47%).