MarketWatch Speaks with Josh Gerben About the Use of Buzzwords in Trademarks

With the success of Beyond Meat, more and more companies add “Beyond” to their product names.

Josh Gerben offers insight on what this means for trademark applications.

Josh Gerben, an attorney who specializes in trademark issues, explains that companies can’t necessarily own a word for all potential uses.

Otherwise, he says, “you would run out of words real quickly.” For example, he notes that both Dove soap and Dove chocolate are able to co-exist without trademark issues.

Source: Passy, Charles. marketwatch.com. “Beyond Meat, Beyond Yoga and Beyond Paint turn one bland word into a high-brow mission statement – but has it gone too far?”. 11 August 2021.