Baldwins
Added: Aug 8, 2012
Your company obtains a trade mark registration for its logo. Some years later, you modernise your packaging and logo with a fresh new look. Do you have to go through the registration process again? Is there a way around this?
Trade mark law requires you to make genuine use of the mark you have registered. If you do not, then a third party may be able to remove the mark from the register on the grounds of non-use (“non-use revocation”). The law allows a trade mark to be varied from the form in which it was registered, but only to a certain extent. To work out whether use of your new logo will be sufficient to defend against non-use revocation of your old registered logo, we must first consider the differences between the marks. We must then consider whether those differences alter the “distinctive character” (under New Zealand law) or “substantially affect the identity” (under Australian law) of the mark