Use of Trademarks
A company must determine whether or not to apply for trademark protection under the federal Lanham Act of 1946 or state law. A trademark gives a firm exclusive use of a "word, symbol, combination of letters or numbers, or other devices such as distinctive packaging used to identify the goods of one company and to distinguish them from other companies" for as long as they are marketed.
Trademarks are voluntary and require a registration procedure that can be time consuming, complex, and expensive. A multinational firm must register trademarks in every country in which it operates. In order for a trademark to be legally protected, it must have a distinctive meaning that does not describe an entire product category, not be confusingly similar to other trademarks, be used in interstate commerce, and not imply characteristics that the product does not possess. A surname by itself cannot be registered, because anyone can do business under his or her name. However, an surname can be registered if used to describe a specific business (e. g. ,Roy Roger’s Restaurants).
When brands become too popular or descriptive of a product category, they run the risk of becoming public property. Then a firm loses its trademark position. Brands that are fighting to remain exclusive trademarks include Xerox, Levi’s Frigidaire, Formica, Kleenex, and Teflon. Brands of former trademarks that are now considered generic and therefore public property are cellophane(赛璐玢),aspirin, kerosene(煤油),cola, linoleum(漆布),and monopoly.
DuPont used careful research to retain a trademark for Teflon. As company survey showed that 68 percent of the consumers questioned identified Teflon as a brand name. This enabled DuPont to win a court case against a Japanese firm using the name Teflon. On the other hand, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that "Monopoly’was a generic term that could be used by any maker. Likewise, a federal court ruled that Miller could not trademark the single word Lite for its lower-calorie(低热量) beer.
Trademark protection is essential to many firms because exclusive use of brands and symbols enables them to maintain long-established images and market shares.
Use of TrademarksAccording to the passage, a trademark can______.