Can I Trademark an Event?

You cannot trademark an event itself, because the format, schedule, activities, and layout are not protectable, but you can trademark the event name, logo, and slogan, and those are what actually prevent someone from launching a competing event under the same brand. The real challenge for event organizers is not whether you qualify, it is proving to the USPTO that you are using the name continuously when your event only happens once or twice a year.

What You Can and Cannot Protect

Protectable elements include the event name (like “Coachella” or “SXSW”), any logo or design mark associated with the event, and a tagline or slogan used in promotion. The Boston Marathon is a registered trademark. The act of running 26.2 miles through Massachusetts is not.

What you cannot protect is the event concept. A three-day outdoor music festival with multiple stages and food vendors is a format, not a brand. Anyone can run a festival with the same structure, but they cannot call it by your trademarked name or use a name similar enough to cause confusion. I will focus here on the event name, which is what most organizers ask about first.

The chart below gives a quick reference to what can and can’t be protected via trademark registration:

The Recurring Use Problem

Here is where event trademarks diverge from standard business filings. A restaurant uses its name every day. A software company uses its mark every time a customer logs in. An annual conference uses its name intensely for a few weeks and then goes quiet for months.

The USPTO requires “continuous use in commerce” to maintain trademark rights, and three consecutive years of nonuse creates a legal presumption of abandonment under the Lanham Act. For event organizers, this raises an obvious question: does running your event once a year count as continuous use?

The answer is yes, if you handle the gaps correctly. The House Judiciary Committee recognized that “the ordinary course of trade” varies by industry, and seasonal or periodic businesses can maintain valid trademark rights with intermittent sales. An annual event is no different from a seasonal product in this respect. But you need to show activity between events, not just during them.

What counts as use between events: a website that stays live and promotes the next edition, ticket or registration sales (even early-bird pricing months in advance), social media accounts posting under the event name, and merchandise sold year-round bearing the event name. What does not count: a parked domain with no content, a dormant social media page, or vague “plans” to hold the event again someday.

When you file your Section 8 declaration (required between years five and six after registration, and every ten years after), you need a specimen proving ongoing use. For services like events, the USPTO accepts advertising and promotional materials that display the mark in direct connection with the service. A screenshot of your event website showing ticket sales or speaker announcements is the most reliable specimen.

Which Trademark Class Does Your Event Need?

Trademark classification trips up event organizers because the correct class depends on the event’s primary purpose, not just the fact that it is an event.

Class 41 (Education and Entertainment) covers most events: conferences, seminars, symposiums, music festivals, award shows, art exhibitions organized for cultural or educational purposes, and sporting events. If people attend your event to learn something or be entertained, Class 41 is almost certainly correct.

Class 35 (Advertising and Business Services) applies when the primary purpose is commercial. Trade shows where exhibitors sell products, business expos, and promotional events fall here. The distinction is whether attendees come to buy and sell or to learn and experience.

Multi-class filings become necessary when your event crosses these boundaries. A tech conference with an exhibition hall where vendors sell products may need both Class 41 (for the educational programming) and Class 35 (for the trade show component). Each additional class adds $350 in government filing fees, so getting this right at the outset matters. Filing in the wrong class wastes your filing fee and forces you to start over.

If your event also sells branded merchandise (t-shirts, mugs, bags), you may need a separate filing in the appropriate goods class, such as Class 25 for clothing. The international trademark class system determines how much protection costs and what it covers.

Enforcement: What Protection Actually Looks Like

Registering your event name is one thing. Enforcing it is another, and the costs are worth understanding before you file.

Coachella is the most aggressive enforcer in the event space. Goldenvoice, which owns the Coachella trademark, has pursued legal action against “Filmchella,” “Moechella,” “Afrochella,” and “Teachella” for using the “-chella” suffix. In 2021, Goldenvoice obtained a temporary restraining order against Live Nation over a “Coachella Day One 22” New Year’s Eve show, with the court ruling that Coachella was likely to succeed on the merits. SXSW has similarly pressured events like “SVSX/Silicon Valley Sound eXperience” and “YxYY/Yes by Yes Yes” into changing their names through cease-and-desist letters.

For smaller event organizers, enforcement usually starts with a cease-and-desist letter ($500 to $1,500 for an attorney to draft). If that does not resolve it, federal trademark litigation routinely costs $50,000 to $150,000 or more through trial. Federal registration makes enforcement practical because it gives you a legal presumption of nationwide ownership and access to enhanced damages including the infringer’s profits. Without registration, you are limited to proving common law rights in the specific geographic area where you have used the name.

Is Federal Registration Worth It for Your Event?

Not every event needs a federal trademark registration.

Federal registration through my firm costs $1,195 plus government filing fees of $350 per class. Add the Section 8 declaration at year five ($325 per class) and the Section 8/9 renewal at year ten ($650 per class), and you are looking at roughly $2,500 to $3,000 over a decade for a single class.

Registration makes financial sense when your event is recurring, generates real revenue through ticket sales, sponsorships, or exhibitor fees, and operates under a name you have invested in building. A regional tech conference pulling in $50,000 in tickets and $20,000 in sponsorships each year has clear reason to protect that brand for $1,500 upfront.

For a one-time fundraiser gala or a small local gathering with no plans to repeat, using the TM symbol (which requires no registration) and relying on common law rights may be sufficient. Common law rights attach the moment you use the name in commerce, but they only protect you in the geographic area where you have actually used it.

If your event has not launched yet, you can file an intent-to-use application (Section 1(b)) to secure your priority date before the first edition. This gives you up to three years after the USPTO issues a Notice of Allowance to submit proof that the event actually happened, plus a $150 per class fee when you file the Statement of Use.

Next Steps

The two questions that matter most for event trademarks are which class your event falls into and whether the name is already taken. Both are answerable before you spend anything on a filing. Reach out to my office and I will tell you where your event fits, whether any conflicts exist, and what the total cost looks like.

The video below explains how we can work together to trademark items related to your event.