[Business Today] The Secret Powers of Trademarks and Brands

By Vincent Teh

Brands and trademarks may seem like modern concepts, but they have been around for centuries, even over a millennium. They date back to the very beginning of our pastoral heritage when men were still farmers and herders. Long before brands and trademarks were burning holes through your wallet they were searing the skin and snipping the flesh of poor farm animals. Incidentally, the word “brand” comes from an old Norse word “brandr” which means to burn. Traditionally, farmers would brand the skin of their farm animals with a hot iron stamp or cut off a small piece of the animals’ ear to “earmark” them so that others would know who the animals belong to.

Even though hundreds of years have passed since men laid down their pitchforks and ploughs in favour of business suits and sexy secretaries, the principal function of brands and trademarks remain relatively unchanged. Like their archaic predecessors, they say who is responsible for which products or services. From this humble origin, brands and trademarks have since moved up the ladder to become multi-million dollar assets, indispensable to most businesses.

Nowadays, millions and even billions are being thrown into branding exercises and trademark designs. For instance, BP paid a whopping USD 211 million (RM 655 million) for a corporate rebranding, the results of which can be seen on almost every BP gas station worldwide.

(Source)

However, sometimes it may not be money well spent. The branding of the 2012 London Summer Olympics, which cost £400,000 (approx. RM1.87 million), introduced a logo which some (no doubt depraved souls) claimed looked like Lisa Simpson performing a sexual act, while Iran threatened to boycott the Games as it insisted that the logo spells out the word “Zion”, a biblical name for Iran’s favourite neighbour Israel. This begs the question of why companies are paying so much on something your 6-year-old niece could make with colour pencils and glitter. Well, that’s because trademarks have superpowers.

“Who will wear a shoe that hurts him, because the shoe-maker tells him ’tis well made?”, a rhetorical question posted by Algernon Sidney, the 17^th Century English politician during the English Civil War. Quite clearly Mr. Sidney was not well acquainted with the modern woman. A company’s branding could be so successful that its customers will relinquish all semblances of rationality (or sanity) when purchasing its products.

Have you seen the shoes women are wearing nowadays? The skyscraper stilettoes, the foot-high platforms – they seem like devices fashioned by sadistic men who delight in nothing more than to see members of the fairer sex blistered and raw.

But why do women buy and willingly suffer those heinous tools of torture? Well, because “it’s a Prada”, “it’s a Jimmy Choo”, “omg it’s a Louboutin”. Every day we are being bombarded by adverts and celebrity endorsements that transmit the subliminal message that these branded goods are “well-made” and “you must have them now”.

Like Professor X, brands and trademarks seem to have the uncanny power to alter the subconscious state of mind of consumers, and whether we like it or not, our buying patterns are intricately affected by them.

Apart from the mind bending powers of brands that I’ve already mentioned above, trademarks also bestow upon brands the Midas touch. Sometimes, they can literally turn anything to pure solid retail gold. Just pop a famous logo (trademark) on any ordinary piece of clothing and, voila, the price will go sky high. For example, some designer jeans look like they were bought from homeless people and subsequently resold by fashion companies complete with sweat, grime and lice for hundreds or even thousands of Ringgit to unsuspecting fashionistas. How do fashion houses get away with it? Well the trademarks attached to the products reassure the consumers that the products are “cool”, and “their quality is beyond doubt”.

“With great power comes great responsibility”, so go the famous last words of Uncle Ben to Peter Parker a.k.a. Spiderman. If you possess all the great powers that your brands and trademarks have given you, your main responsibility would be to protect them by registration.

Difference Between Brands and Trademarks

Although many have used the words “brand” and “trademark” interchangeably, they are not technically the same entity. A brand is the identity or character of a company and therefore too vague to register as an intellectual property right. A trademark on the other hand is an integral part of a brand, it is the face or name of a company, and most importantly, a trademark can be registered. And with that registration, the trademark owner is bestowed with exclusive and monopolistic rights to use the trademark.

However, some companies do take registration rather more seriously than others. Last month, Apple Inc. applied to register the design and layout of its retail shop as a trademark at the United States Patent and Trademark Office, a move so bold and unconventional that some IP practitioners say would surely fail. And in the same vein, some big corporations make the psychotic possessive protagonist (played by the actress Glenn Close) in the movie Fatal Attraction look like a harmless nun. LVMH, the owner of Louis Vuitton, recently demanded HK$25,000 (RM10,000) in compensation from a hair salon owner in Hong Kong for infringing its trademark. The clueless owner was reportedly using an adjustable stool and a reclining shampoo chair which were covered in a fabric that closely resembles LV’s iconic chequered pattern.

These superpowers are jealously guarded by the super corporations because the powers make them special – it sets them and their products apart from the rest. If their trademarks were to fall into the wrong hands (i.e. counterfeiters), they would lose their powers and their products would then reek of mediocrity. After all, if you think about it, wouldn’t you much rather date Superman, the Man of Steel, than the gawky Clark Kent? Okay, maybe minus the red underpants.

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Communications at KASS International Sdn Bhd

KASS International is an established Intellectual Property Firm which offers a one-stop solution for IP matters in Malaysia, South East Asia, and worldwide.