Amazon Brand Registry is a fairly new program designed to protect an Amazon seller's brand. Brands are powerful tools, as they allow the customer to easily and quickly identify the source of the goods they buy. When a brand has a strong identity and a good reputation, consumers are more likely to continue buying from that brand — it is a safe space in an uncertain marketplace, and they know, more or less, what they are buying into. The new Amazon Brand Registry is important, but its specifics can be confusion. Therefore, it is important to understand the basics of both Amazon Brand Registry and the United States Trademark Act.

Brand Registry — What Is It?

The updated Amazon Brand Registry is designed to allow e-commerce sellers on Amazon to access exclusive and powerful tools. These tools range from predictive automation to text and image searching, and more. These tools aim to help sellers continue to drive traffic to their authorized Amazon listings. By using the Amazon Brand Registry, sellers can channel potential customers to their legitimate Amazon listings

Use Brand Registry to Protect Your Brand

Through Brand Registry, Amazon is aiming to address a persistent issues that sellers have been complaining about — namely, that other sellers infringe on one's legitimate trademark or other intellectual property rights. Copycat sellers have been a plague on the Amazon experience — cheap, low-quality goods trading on the good will of higher-qality products. This can result in confused consumers mistakenly purchasing the cheaper, copycat product only to be disappointed with the quality. This poor quality negatively affects the consumer's trust in the legitimate brand — through no fault of its own!

Further, "regular" Amazon sellers must adhere quite tightly to the company's algorithmic requirements. However, Brand Registry sellers have more freedom with respect to product titles, product details, product images, Amazon-issued product IDs. Further, Brand Registry sellers can reduce matching errors that may occur in the listing process. 

Who Qualifies For Amazon Brand Registry?

Sadly, the new Brand Registry program does not allow open admittance. Indeed, only sellers with a registered trademark for their brand are eligible for Amazon Brand Registry. Further, this federal registration must be for a Standard Character Mark or a Typeset Word(s)/Letter(s)/Number(s). Previously, Amazon only required that sellers prove that they owned a website domain name for the brand, that their product packaging included the brand name, and that the product was sold under that brand name. Now, however, sellers must show Amazon that they hold a registered trademark for their brand name, as well as be able to show images of the brand's logo, images of products/packaging with the trademark, a list of product categories under which the brand sells goods, and a list of countries where the brand's products are made and sold. 

In exchange for this, Amazon will work to protect established brands on its e-commerce marketplace. However, the seller must show Amazon that it is investing in its brand — specifically by registering their brand with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

Ultimately, Amazon Brand Registry is available to sellers with a federal trademark registration and who make their own products, who own private label brands, or who sell branded white-label products. Further, traditional manufacturers and authorized distributors can also qualify.

Were You a Brand Registry Enrollee prior to April 30, 2017?

If so, Amazon requires you to re-enroll in Amazon Brand Registry, provided that you meet all of the eligibility requirements. So, even if you were a Brand Registry member prior to these new requirements, you must still take action to register your trademark and then re-enroll in Brand Registry.

So… What Is a Trademark, Anyway?

A trademark is any image, mark, stylized words or text, catch phrase, logo, company name, product name, etc., which is used in commerce and associated with a good or service. Certainly, trademarks can be registered with either state or federal agencies. However, Amazon Brand Registry required federal registration with the USPTO. Importantly, anybody in the world can file a USPTO trademark application — there is no United States citizenry requirement.

After filing the application with the USPTO, the application goes through a rigorous examination process. During this, a USPTO employee weighs the merits of the mark's registration, considering whether the mark is distinctive enough to be entitled to trademark protection and whether or not another registration for the same, or a confusingly similar, mark exists in a similar category of goods or services. 

A trademark application can be as broad or as narrow as the applicant wants. For example, if the applicant only uses the trademark in association with the sale of workout equipment, the applicant can file an application with just one classification. However, if the applicant uses or intends to use the trademark in association with work out equipment, clothing, and cell phone cases, multiple classifications can be filed. An experienced trademark attorney can be invaluable in helping an applicant determine the areas, or classifications, of commerce that a trademark application needs. 

If the mark is eligible for trademark protection, it will be published for opposition. If no members of the public challenge the registration within a set period of time, the applicant is issued a trademark with the registration number. While this sounds fairly straight forward, the process can sometimes become very complicated very quickly. If the USPTO denies the application, the applicant will have to either challenge the refusal or abandon the idea of a federal registration altogether. An experienced attorney can help with this process and can zealously defend your mark in the face of any such refusal.

What Does Trademark Registration Get You?

Trademark registration is an incredibly powerful tool for brands. For example, federal trademark registration with the USPTO bestows the following rights and powers onto the trademark holder:

1. Federal registration provides exclusive intellectual property rights, ensuring that nobody but the trademark holder — or those authorized by the trademark holder — can use the mark.
2. Federal registration allows the trademark holder to file a trademark infringement lawsuit against competitors and copycats who sell similar products under the same or confusingly similar brand name.
3. Federal registration gives the trademark holder the peace of mind that they can properly invest in and build up the brand. By allowing for exclusive use of the trademark, trademark holders can confidently invest in the brand and strive towards building customer loyalty. 
4. Federal registration can provide indefinite protection of a trademark. So long as the mark is continually used in commerce and the proper maintenance and renewal filings are made, a trademark can remain registered forever.
5. Federal registration allows the trademark holder to leverage the power and benefits of Amazon Brand Registry program. This allows trademark holders to easily file and resolve complaints against trademark infringement from copycat sellers on Amazon.
6. Federal registration provides a myriad of other legal protections that an unregistered, common law trademark is not afforded.

Establishing Your Brand on Amazon Brand Registry

For many sellers doing business on Amazon's e-commerce marketplace, registration on Amazon Brand Registry is absolutely vital. If you need help obtaining a federal trademark registration, to ensure Amazon Brand Registry eligibility, you can contact the professional attorneys at Law Offices of John D. Gugliotta, P.E., Esq., LPA. Our trademark experts can help you secure the federal registration that you need to benefit from Amazon's Brand Registry. Contact us today here, or call us at (888) 298-8580.

The Law Offices of John D. Gugliotta, P.E., Esq., LPA publishes this blog for educational purposes only, not to provide specific legal advice. By using this blog site you indicate that you understand there is no attorney-client relationship between you and the Law Offices of John D. Gugliotta, P.E., Esq., LPA. This blog should not be used as a substitute for obtaining legal advice from a licensed attorney. In addition, statements made on this blog represent the viewpoints of the individual authors, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Law Offices of John D. Gugliotta, P.E., Esq., LPA or any of our clients.