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Is Dove Soap And Dove Chocolate The Same Brand! How To Trademark The Same Name

Dove soap and Dove chocolate ? How can both of these trademarks coexist in the marketplace if you are a brand new trademark applicant then you want to know if you can choose a trademark that is already in use by someone else in the same way that Dove coexists as chocolate and as soap make sure you stay till the end because this is a two-part illustration.

In the first part, I’m going to talk about whether or not there is a requirement for you to be able to coexist with someone in the marketplace what is the safest way to choose a name that is already chosen should you even be choosing a name that is already taken by someone else?

In the second part, I’m going to be covering what else is required in order for you to move forward with the name that might already be taken? Well for starters we have to take into account different factors how long have both of these trademarks been coexisting in the marketplace if we do a quick Google search we will see that Dove chocolate has been in existence since ends up soap has been in existence since you’re asking yourself how is it possible that both of these can coexist I want to select a name that’s already chosen but everyone around me is telling me that it’s not a good idea including Marcela?

So here’s the deal if you want to choose a name that is already selected you need to take into account how similar is your trademark to someone else’s you see when we go back to this example of chocolate and soap, chocolate and soap have absolutely nothing to do with each other unless you’re the kind of person that uses chocolate to bathe yourself but in this scenario Dove soap, Dove body care, Dove lotion that is in one category and Dove candy is a consumable right?

I mean if you like chocolate then you’re probably consuming a lot of it analyzing the identification of goods and services or identifying the category in which a particular trademark is going to be registered is extremely important in knowing whether it’s okay to move forward.

So in our example, like I said candy is very different than hygiene products so for purposes of this example they’re different enough that they can more than likely coexist in the marketplace so let’s say that I wanted to start a new brand of processed meats, perhaps selling bologna, turkey, salami and I wanted to call it Dove is that too close to chocolate?

Do you think that would fail the consumer confusion test? listen when you’re asking yourself if your trademark is going to pass the likelihood of confusion tests in your mind it’s very easy to have a biased approach and so you might think well no mine is completely different but you have to be objective or as objective as you can and say how similar is mine to the category that already exists.

Now again, it is extremely easy to be biased and to you know think that your trademark is distinct enough that you are not going to encounter any issues but if you’re reading this blogpost, it’s because you’re interested in educating yourself and really learning what you’re up against, so be honest you know don’t try to pull the wool over your own eyes and look at this as objectively and reasonably as possible in my processed meat.

An example it might be likely that Dove chocolate is too similar to the processed meats that I want to sell with the dove name and for some of you might be thinking, well chocolate has nothing to do with processed Meats but they are both consumables they are both items that you might find in a grocery store and so it might not pass the confusion test so again when you’re asking yourself does this pass the confusion test it’s not always going to be a bright line answer as in yes it’s going to pass it or no it’s not sometimes you might feel like there’s a gray area and that gray area is where you really have to analyze it.

You will be wondering that is it worth the risk? is it worth the time? an investment? I’m going to make in figuring out if this is viable so if it’s not worth the risk to you then choose something completely different you can find my course down below how to choose a name one that is more likely than not to get registered but wait a second I told you at the beginning of this blogpost that I was going to have a part two because is it enough to just say okay they’re completely different from each other I can move forward with my trademark I have nothing to worry about.

In part two, I’m going to talk about the next thing you need to consider if you are going to select a name that’s already out there now be sure to catch that video right there because I go into more depth about what consumer confusion actually means and whether or not you should be concerned so before we finish with part one I want to make sure that you have other examples of two brands that share the same name so take for example Domino’s Pizza and Domino Sugar have you seen these in the grocery store before or have you seen these side by side so what’s another example of two brands with the same name what about Delta Airlines and Delta faucets?

I bet you hadn’t considered these before right because you never really see an airline side by side with a faucet so wait wait one more example United Airlines and United fan lines? How is all of this possible?

Well make sure you stay for part two of this blogpost, so now on to part two does your trademark pass the confusion test? and what do I mean by the confusion test?

In the confusion test, what we have to ask ourselves is a potential consumer going to be confused about the source of my trademark so going back to the dove example when somebody eats the Dove chocolate are they going to think are they going to wonder wow this belongs to the same company that also makes hygiene products that also makes my body wash or my hand soap and history tells us that both of these marks have been in existence long enough that there is no overlap in other words a consumer is not thinking that the Chocolate Company belongs to the Soap Company or vice versa.

So when you are scouring the database, which you should be doing at least a search on the trademark electronic search system you need to be asking yourself is my category story different enough that a potential consumer is not going to be confused now I want to give you some examples of where a consumer might be confused just to give you an idea of what I am talking about so let’s go back to our Dove body care what if I decided to sell Dove toothpaste is that similar enough to hygiene or to soap or to body wash that a potential consumer might be confused about the source of this new Dove toothpaste.

Conclusion

So like I said earlier if you want to know more about the likelihood of confusion tests don’t forget to catch that video right there but if you don’t want to know more about the likelihood of confusion tests and you’re just interested in knowing about a different aspect of the trademark Journey catch that video right there which will be a great continuation to this video and please please don’t forget to give me a thumbs up if you learned something new today I look forward to seeing you in the next video and as always check that out

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