The procedure to register trademarks in the United States of America is not particularly different from the one in the EU.

According to US law, the term ‘trademark’ “includes any word, name, symbol, or device, or any combination thereof used by a person, or which a person has a bona fide intention to use in commerce to identify and distinguish his or her goods, including a unique product, from those manufactured or sold by others and to indicate the source of the goods, even if that source is unknown.”

In America property rights on trademark come into effect when the mark itself starts being used in practice. Thus, its registration with the PTO (Patent and Trademark Office) is not necessary to become the owner of a trademark. Registration, however, offers several advantages beyond simply having one’s property rights recognized; for example the owner of a mark registered in the US owns the rights to products and services specified in the registration and has a right to the trademark’s use on US territory. It is possible to submit a registration request without being a US citizen. To do this, however, it is necessary to designate a US resident as one’s representative for all paperwork.

Unlike copyrights and patents, trademark rights can last indefinitely as long as the owner continues to use them to identify his or her products or services. Registration lasts 10 years, with the option to renew it for another 10.

How are disputes over trademarks settled? During the registration phase a PTO representative consults the registered trademark database (publicly available). Just like in the EU, the yardstick to determine whether there is a conflict is the likelihood that the average consumer might get confused.

Ensuring that one’s goods and services are not attributed to a different producer should be taken seriously. The two facts that are taken in consideration during the assessment are the similarity between the two marks and whether they belong to similar sectors. Just like in the EU, to be considered ‘in conflict’ the trademarks do not need to be identical, but similar enough to create confusion ‘at first glance’ among consumers browsing in a store. The most common method to solve disputes over trademarks in America is temporal; when there are two or more trademark registration requests are presented the earliest is usually accepted while the later ones are rejected.