Do Trademark Lawyers Matter?

The Commissioner for Trademarks recently came to Denver to visit with several Denver area trademark attorneys. I was thrilled to be a part of this group, and to have the opportunity to glean some inside info about the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The Commissioner spent the greater part of an hour detailing office statistics and results with us. One of the items that stuck out to me was the fact that today approximately 30% of applications for trademark registration are filed “pro se,” or by unrepresented applicants.

The Commissioner noted that trademark applications filed by an attorney on behalf of a client achieve registration approximately 60% of the time, whereas only 40% of applications filed pro se ever become registered trademarks. I think this answers the question in the affirmative… yes, trademark lawyers do matter, after all!

The USPTO Visualization Dashboard has a lot of other statistics that are interesting to trademark geeks for me. For instance, more than 30% of applications filed using TEAS Plus (using the PTO's pre-approved descriptions of goods or services) are approved on the first examinations, vs 15% of those using TEAS RF (writing custom descriptions and paying a slightly higher fee).

Photo by Tingey Injury Law Firm on Unsplash