When Progressive Towing & Hauling, LLC opened for business in Maryland, the owners probably thought they’d chosen a forward-thinking name. What they didn’t anticipate was a federal lawsuit from one of America’s largest insurance companies. On October 14, 2025, Progressive Casualty Insurance Company sued the small towing operation for copying not just their name, but their distinctive blue color and italicized font. Despite cease and desist letters in May and September 2025, the towing company kept operating. This trademark battle illustrates a reality I’ve seen repeatedly: ignorance of trademark law is never a defense.
Progressive Insurance vs. Progressive Towing: The Case Facts
Progressive Casualty Insurance Company has operated under the PROGRESSIVE name since 1937, giving them 88 years of continuous trademark use. This Ohio corporation maintains 277 offices nationwide and offers auto insurance in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Their distinctive branding, including that specific shade of blue and italicized font, has become instantly recognizable through decades of advertising.
Against this 88-year legacy, Progressive Towing & Hauling, LLC is a Maryland limited liability company offering towing, winching, jump-starts, fuel delivery, and vehicle lockout services. According to court documents filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, Southern Division, the towing company adopted a logo using the term “PROGRESSIVE” in the same stylized, italic font and blue color as Progressive Insurance’s federally registered marks.
The timeline reveals escalating enforcement that the Maryland company ignored. Progressive Insurance discovered the conduct around March 2025 and sent their first cease and desist letter in May 2025. When that produced no response, they sent a second letter in September 2025. The towing company continued operations despite both warnings, forcing Progressive Insurance to file suit on October 14, 2025.
The complaint accuses Progressive Towing & Hauling of willful trademark infringement, unfair competition, trademark dilution, and deceptive trade practices. Progressive Insurance emphasizes the service overlap: their 24/7 Roadside Assistance program offers the exact same services as the towing company. Progressive seeks a preliminary injunction, permanent injunction, monetary damages, and litigation costs. The case remains at the complaint stage, but the legal framework reveals why Progressive Insurance likely has a strong case.
How Trademark Law Makes This Case So Strong
When I work with the USPTO and review potential trademark cases, I examine the likelihood of confusion factors that courts consider. This case presents textbook infringement: the marks are nearly identical, the services overlap directly in roadside assistance, and Progressive Insurance holds an extremely strong mark after 88 years of continuous use.
What elevates this to willful infringement is the defendant’s conduct after receiving notice. The two cease and desist letters in May and September 2025 established clear knowledge of Progressive Insurance’s trademark rights. Continuing to use the mark after those letters transforms an innocent mistake into deliberate infringement. Courts view this distinction as critical because willful infringement opens the door to enhanced damages.
Beyond likelihood of confusion, Progressive Insurance also claims trademark dilution, which operates under different legal principles. Dilution doesn’t require consumer confusion. Instead, it protects famous marks from blurring, which weakens their distinctive quality. Progressive Insurance almost certainly qualifies as a famous mark given their national presence and extensive advertising.
The unfair competition claims under Maryland state law provide another avenue for relief. These parallel the federal claims but offer different remedies. All of these claims rest on federal trademark registration, which creates a legal presumption of ownership nationwide and grants the right to use the registered trademark symbol. These benefits make enforcement dramatically easier than relying on common law rights alone.
Understanding why this case is legally strong leads to a bigger question: why do towing companies keep making this mistake?
Why Towing Companies Face Unique Trademark Risks
Service businesses face different branding challenges than product manufacturers. When you sell physical products, you differentiate through packaging and design. Service businesses lack these tangible differentiators. For towing companies, your business is your trucks on the road and your reputation, which makes your name and visual branding carry enormous weight.
This reliance on branding has collided with a major market shift. Insurance companies like Progressive have moved into what was traditionally the towing industry’s territory. Progressive’s 24/7 Roadside Assistance program competes directly with independent towing companies. When an insurance company dominates consumer awareness with their brand and then offers the same services you do, likelihood of confusion becomes almost inevitable if you’re using similar branding.
I’ve seen how this trap catches business owners. One towing company client came to me after operating for two years under a name that conflicted with a larger competitor’s trademark. The pattern repeats: entrepreneurs choose names that sound generic but turn out to be protected marks. Terms like “Rapid,” “Premier,” or “Progressive” feel like common vocabulary. That intuition is wrong. When another company has invested millions in building brand recognition around that term, it becomes their protected intellectual property.
Digital presence amplifies local infringement. Progressive Towing & Hauling probably intended to operate purely locally, but their website, Google My Business listing, and social media created a national presence. Search engines don’t respect geographic boundaries. The internet has eliminated the “we’re just a small local company” defense, and that digital exposure creates the interstate commerce trigger that brings federal trademark law into play.
These vulnerabilities aren’t unique to towing companies. Every small business faces the same fundamental challenges when choosing a brand.
The Expensive Lessons Every Small Business Must Learn
The financial consequences of trademark ignorance are staggering. Federal trademark litigation typically costs between $50,000 and $250,000 to defend. That’s before rebranding expenses. For Progressive Towing & Hauling, rebranding means repainting every truck, replacing all signage, redesigning marketing materials, and rebuilding their website. The total cost could easily exceed $300,000.
These costs trace back to fundamental misconceptions. The conversation I have with every startup begins by dispelling this myth: dictionary words can absolutely be protected trademarks when used in specific contexts. “Progressive” seems like a generic descriptor, but Progressive Insurance has made it a distinctive identifier through 88 years of use and billions in advertising. The assumption that “it’s just a common word, so anyone can use it” has cost business owners millions.
Business owners also wrongly believe geographic distance provides protection, but that defense collapsed with the internet. Federal trademark registration grants nationwide rights from day one. Your website and social media create interstate commerce regardless of whether you physically operate outside your local area. Even a purely local Maryland business creates digital footprints that reach across state lines, triggering federal jurisdiction.
The cease and desist letter represents the critical juncture where costs can be contained or will explode. That first letter Progressive Towing received in May 2025 was their opportunity to settle for maybe $5,000 to $10,000 and a six-month rebrand timeline. The second letter in September 2025 was the final warning. Continuing operations after that made litigation inevitable and transformed the characterization from innocent mistake to willful infringement, which multiplies potential damages.
The preventive solution costs a fraction of litigation. A thorough trademark clearance search and filing costs $1,095 (plus government fees.) Federal litigation costs $50,000 to $250,000 or more. That search needs to cover the federal trademark database through the USPTO, all 50 state databases, common law research, and internet searches. Searching just the USPTO catches maybe 60% of potential conflicts. The other 40% can still sue you.
Every expensive lesson points to one solution: get professional trademark counsel before you launch, not after you’re defending a lawsuit.
How Professional Trademark Counsel Prevents These Disasters
I personally handle every trademark search my office conducts because the analysis requires legal judgment, not just database queries. A thorough search means understanding how courts analyze likelihood of confusion, recognizing visual similarities that algorithms miss, and assessing how similar is too similar in your specific industry.
My Complete Trademark Search and Filing Package could have prevented the Progressive Towing disaster immediately. The federal database search would have revealed Progressive Insurance’s registrations within hours. The search report would have documented 88 years of continuous use, famous mark status, and their 24/7 Roadside Assistance program competing in the same market. My written opinion letter would have likely advised against that name and presented alternative branding strategies.
That package includes federal searches through the USPTO, state searches across all 50 states, common law review, and internet searches. Within 3-5 business days, you receive a detailed search report and written opinion letter that I prepare personally. During our phone consultation, we discuss findings and develop strategy. If conflicts exist, we explore alternatives. If the search comes back clear, I prepare and file your trademark application, then monitor it through registration.
The investment of $1,095 for this package could have saved Progressive Towing over $200,000 in legal fees and rebranding costs. I founded my practice in 2007 because I saw too many entrepreneurs getting crushed by intellectual property issues that nobody explained to them properly. Since then, I’ve filed over 6,000 trademark applications and learned exactly where businesses make mistakes. In 2010, The Trademark Insider ranked me the number one trademark attorney in the United States based on application volume, but what matters more is that you’ll work directly with me throughout the process, not hand-offs to junior associates. I want you to understand what’s happening at every stage.
If you’ve already received a cease and desist letter, the timeline compresses dramatically. I provide immediate legal analysis, assess whether settlement or defense makes strategic sense, and handle negotiations with opposing counsel. Sometimes rebranding is the smart business decision. Sometimes the claims are weak and we push back. Either way, you need experienced counsel making that assessment.
My approach starts with thorough clearance because prevention costs pennies compared to litigation dollars.
Don’t Let Your Brand Become the Next Lawsuit
Progressive Towing & Hauling probably invested tens of thousands before they received that first cease and desist letter in May 2025. Now they face a federal lawsuit, potential six-figure legal bills, mandatory rebranding, and possible damages. All of this stemmed from one avoidable decision: choosing a brand name without conducting a proper trademark search.
Contact my office today for a free initial consultation. Whether you’re launching a new business, operating under an uncertain name, or you’ve received a cease and desist letter, we can assess your situation and develop a protection strategy.
