Snackelboxes, Risks of Slang in Trademark Registration

Snacklebox: Risks of New Slang Words in Trademark Registration.

Snacklebox was recently denied a registration for its trademark name by the USPTO for being "merely descriptive." Mere descriptiveness is a common rejection, and is given when a trademark's wording describes the product itself.

Usually, the USPTO uses dictionary definitions such as the Oxford dictionary to determine if the definition of words in a trademark matches the product. In most cases, standard dictionaries are used.

Snacklebox was not so lucky. "Snackle" is a fairly new slang for "small snacks" and is not defined in the Oxford dictionary. However, "Snackle" is defined on the internet dictionary known as "Wiktionary," a crowd-sourced dictionary that includes slang terms.

Together, Snackle + Box = a small snack box, which is descriptive of what the product actually was. So a merely descriptive rejection was given.

Trademark applicants should now to double check when their trademark uses unofficial slang, as the USPTO has demonstrated that finding a definition of the slang term even from nontraditional dictionaries is sufficient to refuse a trademark registration.

Link: https://lnkd.in/gT48Q8g8