The list has expanded! More than 40 common words have been registered as trademarks

An Amazon seller's account was restricted by an infringement email, and the 60,000 yuan of funds and more than 5,000 stocks in the account were directly restricted. If the problem is not handled properly, the account will be useless. After years of hard work, it is back to the old days overnight. In the cross-border circle, it is not uncommon for sellers to lose their years of business results due to infringement issues.

Infringement complaints are extremely serious issues for cross-border sellers, which may cause them to suffer significant losses in terms of economy, reputation and law, so they usually pay great attention to avoiding behaviors that may cause infringement. However, even with such caution, the risk of infringement is still difficult to completely eliminate, because there are too many pitfalls of infringement, such as common word trademark infringement, which is a passive infringement that sellers cannot guard against at all.

The list of commonly used word trademarks is expanded again

Many people find it incredible that the names of items can be registered as trademarks, but this is indeed a major problem faced by cross-border sellers in common word trademarks. For example, HulaHoop and EYELINER have caused serious damage to a large number of sellers. In this case, sellers in the category where the item belongs are often the first to bear the brunt. And now the scope of this damage is still expanding.

Recently, Yien.com discovered that the following three item names have also been registered as trademarks.

1. Coins

Coins means "coins/coins". According to USPTO data, many people have tried to register it as a trademark over the years, but most of them have failed, and only four are currently in effect.

Of the four trademark holders, three are companies located in the United States and the United Kingdom, and the other is an individual in China. It was this Chinese who "took action" against the seller.

USPTO data shows that the trademark "Coins" held by Hong Zhuogui was certified in 2017, with registration categories: 037, 039, 040, 042, 050, and the scope of protection is hook and loop fastening tape.

According to reports, in November last year, Hong Zhuo gui sued others for infringement in the Northern District Court of Illinois, USA (case number: 23-cv-16216).

Although its representative products are mainly ring-shaped Velcro, if he takes this trademark to complain on the platform, a large number of sellers will be hurt, especially in the collectible coin category.

2. SUPERBALL

SUPER BALL means "bouncy ball". You should know that many sellers in the cross-border circle have suffered losses from HulaHoop, and the holder of the SUPERBALL trademark is the same as HulaHoop, both of which are American youth outdoor toy sports brand "Wham-O".

The trademark was issued in 2012 and has a very broad scope of protection, including Christmas decorations, surfboards, basketball backboards, yo-yos, action figures and accessories, marbles, sports balls, volleyball nets, balloons, discuses, etc., as many as dozens of items.

Although Wham-O has not yet filed a case against SUPERBALL, sellers should also be careful to avoid it.

After all, Wham-O has taught sellers a lot of lessons. In addition to HulaHoop, it has filed multiple cases against the frisbee trademark in 2018, 2022, and 2023. Many Chinese sellers were implicated because they used the generic name "frisbee" in their listings.

3. Bacon Bin

Bacon Bin means "bacon box". This product is actually a kitchen utensil used to filter grease and preserve lard. However, the name Bacon Bin is not only a synonym for the product, but also a US trademark. Its owner is Talisman Designs LLC , a creative kitchenware brand in the United States.

The brand has filed infringement complaints on multiple cross-border platforms, such as Ebay, Amazon, AliExpress, Wish, etc. Some sellers may use it as a product name during the listing editing process, resulting in infringement.

It is also worth noting that Yien.com found that in March this year, another company (Nifty Home Products, Inc) applied to register Bacon Bin as a trademark, and the application is still in the "agent" status. It is reported that Nifty Home Products, Inc and Talisman Designs LLC are actually the same company , which means that Talisman Designs LLC changed its name to apply for the same trademark. Sellers should pay attention to this.

More than 40 common words have been registered as trademarks

In recent years, Ennet has been tracking the news of common words being registered as trademarks. According to incomplete statistics, there are more than 40 common words that have been registered as trademarks, including 100%, one, Tetris, yoyo, Organic, Frisbee, airbag, Generic, Brandless, Nologo, N/A, N/B, nobrand, Apple, Chapstick, Band-Aid, polo, HulaHoop, VELCRO, PINK, VR BOX, Pandora, the, Operation, Material, Durable, Unicorn, Mooncake, Summer, Morandi, PURPLE, Trump, USB, collapsible, describe/description, ideal, perfect, chew, Pcs, inches, ounce, XM-L, EYELINER, off-white, and Ring.

Some people with bad intentions even profit from this by applying for a large number of trademarks, waiting for sellers to step in. Previously, a seller reported that he found that someone had registered more than 300 trademarks through 5 vests, most of which were electronic component models, "especially EEPROM, I don't know how it was registered."

Sellers are very angry about the increasing scope of attacks, but they can only suffer in silence. One seller once said helplessly that last year she lost more than 10,000 US dollars because of an inconspicuous word in A+, because the other party registered this word as a trademark. Although the two words in this trademark can be used as modifiers separately, she was still sued by the rogue law firm. "In this case, I should have responded to the lawsuit, but I didn't have time to deal with them, so I had to settle."

"Do they have a clear conscience? Who would want to take advantage of such a biased word?" Although the problem was solved, she still couldn't help but complain.

Another seller was also speechless about the common word trademark. The seller said that the link he had just created was reported for infringement of the description and a word in the five points, and finally all the detail pages were removed . " Fortunately, the goods have not been shipped yet. It's really hard to guard against it. "

It is reported that the infringing word mentioned by the seller is the operation mentioned above .

After knowing that these words have been registered as trademarks, most sellers know to avoid them, but a small number of sellers are still struggling because these words happen to be the core keywords of their products.

So they raised this question: The product I make has nothing to do with the business scope of this trademark. Would it be considered infringement if I put this keyword in the title and point blank?

Judging from a lot of feedback, this is not considered infringement, but there is a risk of being complained about. Trademarks protect large categories, so if the seller's products are completely in a different category from the other party's, there is no problem with writing it down.

But sellers all know that the actual implementation is not like this. First, trademark hooligans or rogue law firms will take the trademarks that have been issued to the court to sue, and then ask the platform to freeze the sellers' accounts in batches. At this time, the platform will not care whether you and the right holder are in the same category. I believe sellers have learned this from many freezing cases.

Secondly, if a trademark has been recognized as a well-known trademark, its protection scope may be wider, and even if a similar mark is used on different categories of goods or services, it may constitute infringement. For example, for brands like Nike and Adidas Marvel, Amazon itself has a system to clean up, and sellers must delete them if they are found.

Therefore, the best way to deal with the infringement risks brought by common words that have been applied for as trademarks is to avoid them in advance.

Common words registered as trademarks