Can we have the same trademark for many different kinds of products? We have a mark that is used widely on a bunch of different products. Is that allowed under the trademark rules? The answer is an emphatic yes.
The main thing that we care about is the likelihood of consumer confusion. When we have a trademark that is the same for several different types of goods, then we have to ask, “If we issue this trademark for the same term, will the people who already have the trademark for that term, for other goods, will the consumer be confused and think that the new proposed trademark — let’s call it the junior mark — comes from the same company that produces the goods or services for the senior trademark? If so, then it creates a likelihood of confusion in the mind of the consumer, and the junior trademark will not be allowed to issue. If the answer is no, then there is no likelihood of confusion, and so the junior trademark will issue.
The mark we are looking at here is called DOMINION. I was doing some trademark research this morning, and Dominion is a very popular trademark, having 19 live records in the trademark database. But the reason why these 19 registrations were all allowed is because the goods are so dissimilar from one another that no consumer confronted with the DOMINION trademark, for example, for machine parts, would think that that same company made game cameras because it’s not usual in commerce to see the same people making game cameras and machine parts.
There is also a DOMINION trademark for cooking ovens. Do the same people typically make machine parts and cooking ovens? No. So there isn’t a likelihood that those two those two different types of goods bearing the same trademark would be confused and lead the consumer to believe that they come from the same source.
We also have DOMINION in use for plumbing fittings, for loudspeaker systems, for trading cards, and for card games. The DOMINION mark is also used on leather coats, leather headwear, leather jackets, and pesticides for public health. We also have DOMINION marks for luggage, commercial administration of the licensing of prerecorded music, and electronic controllers for keyboard a video mouse. The point here is that we can have a mark that is broadly used on a variety of different goods and services and still not have any of those trademarks be considered infringing upon anyone else’s trademark, because the goods and services are so very different that no consumer would be confused by the usage, and mistakenly believe that the goods all came from the same company or source.
The point: Even if somebody else is using your desired trademark on something else, you may still be able to use that trademark on your goods. It just depends on whether or not your goods and the senior trademark holders’ goods are related in a way that would be considered “confusingly similar” under the trademark law. If the goods are considered “related,” then the marks will be found “confusingly similar,” and the junior mark will not issue.
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