Canadian Trademark Application

You have developed your product or perfected your service, have located a place to run your business and have created the ideal brand. What do you consider to be the most important aspect of your business? Many business owners do not realize that the brand associated with their goods or services can become their most valuable asset.

If you are successful with your business and begin franchising or if your business attracts the interest of another entity that wants to purchase your business, your brand will comprise one of the assets that is being franchised or sold. In order to ensure that you are protecting what is likely to become your most valuable asset, commencing the process to register your trademark is highly recommended.

In order to apply to have your trademark registered, you must consider a number of things about your trademark:

• What type of trademark are you registering? An ordinary mark, a distinguishing guise, a certification mark or an official mark?
• Who is going to be the owner of your trademark? Will it be you, with a licence to your company to use the trademark, your company or some other entity?
• Have you begun using your trademark and, if so, were you the original owner or was it used by a predecessor? When did you or your predecessor begin using it?
• Do you foresee using your trademark with any goods and/or services in the future?
• If you have a stylized or design trademark, are you going to claim colour as a feature of the trademark?  Have you ensured that all copyright has been assigned to you and that all moral rights have been waived by the creator of your design trademark?
• What types of goods and/or services do you want to associate with your trademark?

These questions must be answered in order to provide a properly completed trademark application. Our intellectual property team can assist you with considering and answering these questions and ensuring that your goods and/or services are described in the required “ordinary commercial terms” prescribed by the Canadian Intellectual Property Office.