How to Protect Your Trademark or Copyright Against Foreign Infringers?

How to Protect Your Trademark or Copyright Against Foreign Infringers?

Copyright and Trademark infringement is big business, and there’s lots of money to be made in the sale of counterfeit goods. Companies spend millions of dollars in advertising and promotion of their products, and then have to deal with unscrupulous manufacturers, especially from overseas (China seems to be a particularly naughty offender), who sell goods labeled with a luxury brand that don’t meet the luxury brand standards. This results in tarnishment of the brand’s reputation and dilution of the brand in the eyes of the consumer. After all, who wants to spend thousands of dollars on a Louis Vuitton bag, when the virtually identical item can be purchased for one-tenth the price from the back of a shop in a downmarket part of town?

Granted, the purchase of the bag at a luxury retailer is part of an overall experience, but carrying a bag with an exclusive label (or owning the luggage/golf clubs/jacket/shoes…insert your favorite luxury item here) is part of the fun of owning an item from a luxury brand. So to protect their luxury reputation, most brands spend a good deal on brand enforcement. Often, however, the process is akin to that “Whack-A-Mole” game, where as soon as one naughty infringer is stopped, another one pops up in its place. So what’s a luxury brand to do to staunch the never-ending stream of fraudulent luxury goods that enter the developed world at every port?

Aside from suing naughty infringers for copyright or trademark infringement, manufacturers of luxury goods can register their trademarks and copyrights with Customs and Border Patrol here in the United States. The regulations in the Federal Register allow the owners of registered trademarks (but only on the Principal Register; sorry, Supplemental Registrants) to apply to have Customs impound counterfeit goods at the border. Note that the trademark must be registered; just having submitted a trademark application is not sufficient to trigger the aid of customs to enforce your trademarks and prevent the entry of counterfeit goods.

The application for the recordation of your trademark with Customs and Border Patrol allows the trademark owner to specify the place of manufacture of the goods, as well as the name and address of any foreign entities that are authorized to use the trademark. This allows CBP to compare the shipping address of the goods with the authorization on file, and impound any goods not from those authorized sources.

For copyrights, having applied to register the work with the copyright office is enough to trigger eligibility for protection from Customs and Border Patrol. The owner must specify the country of manufacture of the genuine copies of the work, as well as the name and address of those entities authorized to make such copies. This allows CBP to separate authorized from unauthorized copies.

Is the system perfect? Of course not. There will always be those who steal the intellectual property of others for profit, and Customs can’t possibly inspect every box and barrel coming over the border. The registration system does, however, give purveyors of goods of every kind at least some way to prevent the importation of counterfeit goods.

You can find me online at https://rebrand.ly/trademarks. “Like” my facebook page, https://rebrand.ly/trademarkdoctoronFB to be notified every time I go LIVE.

Trademark questions? Message me on the Trademark Doctor Facebook page, and I’ll answer your questions on a future Live video.

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