A wine sold in cartons and a tequila sold in 750 mL bottles have spent more than five years fighting over a bandit. The wine side had won twice before October 29, 2026, when a federal appeals panel reversed Sutter Home Winery’s summary judgment and sent the case back to the district court. Sutter Home’s … Read more
Between November 24, 1999 and January 15, 2000, five terms from the Harry Potter novels reached the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as trademark applications: QUIDDITCH, GRYFFINDOR, HOGWARTS, HARRY POTTER, and MUGGLES. All five became registrations now owned by Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc., and each one covers a specific set of goods, such as Halloween … Read more
On October 21, 2026, backup dancers in look-alike blue-and-white uniforms joined My Chemical Romance at the Hollywood Bowl and picked up prop rifles for a staged firefight. Five days later, the company behind the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders asked a Texas court to keep that look off the stage. The Hollywood Bowl Costumes Prompt a Trademark … Read more
Target opened its first store in Roseville, Minnesota, on May 1, 1962, under a red-and-white bullseye that pictured its name. Since then the symbol has been redrawn twice, defended before the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, and given a numbered shade of red that the company uses to name a 2026 collection. That red is … Read more
In 1903, Ford Motor Company’s first emblem crowded the company name inside ornate decoration. By December 1927, when Ford introduced the 1928 Model A, the badge had narrowed to flowing script inside a blue oval, a pairing Ford has redrawn several times since without abandoning it. 1903: An Ornate Beginning Henry Ford and 12 others … Read more
Rivian has asked the USPTO to block RAVAN, a name proposed for software and hardware used in autonomous vehicles and robotic systems. Its intellectual property company argues that the name could make buyers believe the technology comes from, or is connected to, Rivian. Rivian Targets RAVAN’s Vehicle and Robotics Technology On October 14, 2026, Rivian … Read more
On September 9, 2014, Apple unveiled a watch it called Apple Watch and filed its own application for APPLE WATCH at the USPTO the same day, serial 86389914. By then, other businesses had already filed for or registered IWATCH in the United States, the European Union, and the United Kingdom, and fights over the word … Read more
Apple’s name, a curved Swoosh, and NBC’s chimes point customers toward very different businesses. The Swoosh carries no letters at all, yet the bare design earned its own federal registration on January 22, 1974, covering athletic shoes and uniforms. Famous Names, Logos, and Slogans A trademark tells buyers who stands behind a product or service, … Read more
Sara Landry’s name sits on hard-techno releases, and HEKATE Records is the label she built to put out her music and work by other artists. Her trademark company now says a former management firm kept using both names after the relationship ended, as if it still had authority to act for her. The case turns … Read more
Fruit of the Loom says its logo has never included a cornucopia. The logo has had seven dated versions since 1893, and on the trademark register the word cornucopia shows up in a design search code attached to a 1973 detergent application. Fruit on a Bolt of Cloth Benjamin and Robert Knight took full ownership … Read more
By the time Nvidia and two Arizona software companies told a Texas federal court on September 25, 2026 that they had resolved their trademark fight, the disputed name had already left Nvidia’s product. Its physics machine learning framework had been PhysicsNeMo since 2025. The lawsuit over its old name, MODULUS, kept going for more than … Read more
A draped woman raises a torch, and its light spills across the clouds behind her. The figure that opens a Columbia Pictures film looks a lot like the Statue of Liberty. She has a name and a history of her own: the studio has used her image since 1924, rebuilt it from an oil painting … Read more
Silas Wilson released a new single under the name Ovrkast. on September 10, 2026. Six days later, the company that holds OutKast’s trademarks asked a federal court in Georgia to stop him from using that name and to rule that he had already agreed to give it up. The Lawsuit Puts Ovrkast’s Artist Name In … Read more
On April 21, 2026, a Swedish apparel company asked the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board to refuse registration of a phrase many Chicagoans know from their social feeds: “Everything Dope About America Comes From Chicago.” In the applied-for design, “DOPE” sits in the middle in letters larger than everything around it. That one word is … Read more
Songs For Littles, LLC, the company behind Ms. Rachel, paid $2,400 on May 27, 2026 to ask the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board to cancel the LIL HERBIE SERIES registration. The USPTO had cited that registration against three HERBIE applications for the show’s orange puppet. Registrant Sherrikka Myers says her mark never went unused. One … Read more
One CareFirst sells health coverage; the other provides in-home healthcare and staffing. On August 27, 2026, the insurer took their shared name to federal court. CareFirst Takes a Local Provider to Court The lawsuit, CareFirst of Maryland, Inc. v. CareFirst Community Health, LLC, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. … Read more