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Recommend Trade Names Don't Do Much to Protect Business Owners (Email)

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Sometimes clients ask about trade name rights.

Trade names are formal company names. They can be registered with the Secretary of State, which will prevent another business in the same state from registering the identical name.

Beyond that, they’re not very useful. Indeed, business owners should forget about them when looking to protect their rights. They instead should focus on protecting their trademarks.

A trade name can certainly be a trademark. In fact, they often are. But it is the branding of goods and services with the name — and the reputation that follows — that creates trademark rights. The more a customer is exposed to a brand, the more rights that arise in the mark.

Registering a trademark is the best way to maximize one’s trademark rights. Registering a trade name hardly does anything.


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