Tabberone is pronounced tab ber won |
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Source: http://www.bitlaw.com/trademark/common.html |
Common law trademark rights are limited to the geographic area in which the mark is used. Thus, if a coffee blend is sold under the name BLASTER in
California only, the trademark rights to that name exist only in California. If another coffee retailer begins to market a different blend in New York under
the same name (assuming they had no knowledge of the California company), then there would be no trademark infringement. However, if the New York
company attempted to sell their coffee blend nation-wide, they would discover that the California company's common law rights to the mark would
prevent them from entering the California market.
Effect of common law marks on trademark searches: Since no registration is required in order to establish common law rights to a trademark, it can be difficult to discover whether anyone has trademark rights in a particular mark. This is the legal background for the difficulties and expenses involved in trademark clearance searches. If registration were required for trademark rights, clearance searches would only need to examine trademark registers. Under U.S. law, however, an attempt must be made to discover these common law rights. |
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