What does trademark decision Refusal Reversed mean?

Did your trademark case receive notification that stated “refusal reversed”? If a person applies for the registration of a trademark, the application is first sent to an evaluating attorney. This attorney will then conduct a trademark search of the records maintained by the United States Patent and Trademark Office and look for any possible conflicts of the potential mark to already existing marks. Conflicts can occur in several different ways. The sound of the trademark, even though the spelling is different, the appearance the the mark, the meaning behind the marks, even though they may be totally different words, or similar design elements that are a part of both marks, all can be reasons for refusal.

What does trademark decision Refusal Reversed mean?

“In trademark law, “Refusal Reversed” means that the TTAB board decided that the trademark in question can indeed be registered, thus reversing the first decision.”

In trademark law, if the applicant is denied by the examining attorney, they are allowed to appeal to the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board to have that decision overturned. If the board does, indeed, allow the trademark to be registered to that individual, the term used to indicate this is “Refusal Reversed.” For example, if person A wants to register a trademark that is somewhat similar to a trademark owned by person B, the initial attorney might deny it on that basis. It is up to the board, then, to determine if the similarity is enough to warrant the refusal. In this case they will look deeper at things like the type of goods that are being sold under both trademarks, whether person A already has a similar trademark registered, the length of time person B has had the trademark and other relevant factors.

The idea behind it is to determine if there would be any confusion for the public as to which entity the trademark is referring to. If they find that the confusion factor isn’t really an issue, they will reverse the refusal of the initial attorney, hence, “Refusal Reversed.”