The Trademarkroom has been providing trade mark protection services for over 15 years. In this time, our Clients have achieved amazing success in their chosen areas.
It is important for aspiring business owners to see success while they are working hard to build their own businesses, therefore we would like to shine the spotlight on some of the Trademarkroom’s success stories and delve deeper into the thoughts and story of the brains behind these businesses.
Today’s spotlight is on Pier Sales Limited. Director Gavin Markscheffel has been a longstanding Trademarkroom client and was kind enough to reflect for us.
Please tell us about your business and the background on how it all started!
I have been in the bicycle and wheeled toys business for almost 40 years. I was initially in a family business which we sold back in 2008. Since then, I have had a few different companies but have remained in the same products. This is currently Electric Bikes, Regular Bikes and wheel toys including battery operated cars, skateboards, scooters etc.
Why did you feel filing your brand as a registered trade mark was important enough to make it a priority?
I have always believed it to be important to protect the brand names we use. We supply a lot of the larger retail companies in the UK and US, and we need to make sure the brands we supply to them are safe. The reputation of a brand within these retailers can rise and fall very quickly and if our brand is doing very well then it is harder for the retailer to look elsewhere for the same product. Also as long as our brand is protected, no one can jump off the back of our success and imitate the brand.
Did you have any goals when it came to trade mark protection?
The goals are really similar to the answers in Point 2.
What did you learn during the application process?
The biggest thing I learnt was that you cannot just look at the identical name you want to register, you have to also look at similar names. The word confusion comes up quite a lot during this process and I always put myself in the position of a judge deciding if there would be confusion. If I think there wouldn’t be then that should be ok.
How did the Trademarkroom help you with the process?
The Trademarkroom help in the whole process of registering a brand. From the initial searches to recommendations on confusion. I consider you guys to be the experts and if you are telling me there are good grounds or strong grounds for confusion then I do listen.
Do you have any advice for fellow business owners when it comes to trade marks?
As I have already said, I believe it to be very important to register brand names, so my advice is always going to be if you are building a brand or want to build a brand then start with the registration process before you do anything else. If you built a brand or even got a brand selected only to find at a later date it cannot be registered or even worse its already registered with someone else then you will have lost a lot of time, effort and money, not to mention you would look a bit foolish in front of your customer.
