Trademark advice

[Shaunj15]

Hi all,

I am in the process of starting a new company specialising in the construction and sale of "tiny houses" in the UK - the same as the ones currently taking America by storm.

The issue I have is that one of the main companies in the UK who currently build and sell these homes have a registered trademark.

When looking on the IPO website it states that the mark text is: 'Tiny House' and it then also has a registered image. There is a UK and an EU patent.

Does this therefore mean that I cannot call my company anything to do with 'tiny house'?

The reason I ask is because within the industry the house are infamously called tiny houses therefore as this is the generic term that they are called does the trademark restrict me from using those terms at all?

Say for example if I wanted to call my business 'tiny house living' or 'tiny house dream' would these names be allowed or do they infringe on the patent?

The patent numbers are:
UK00003020317
EU012651601

Many thanks for your time and any advice is greatly appreciated

Shaun

 

[Deggle]

Given my experience with the IPO in the past trying to get trademarks registered that are less common usage than 'Tiny House' I very much think you'd have a good case to request the registration (the text mark not their logo) is revoked.

The USA shows have done you a favour here, as you can make a case that the term 'Tiny House' is now in common usage and the UK trademark owner are unable to assert ownership of it. I'm not sure, but I think there's a form on the IPO website to start this process and I doubt it's very expensive.

Having said all that - looking at the registrations I can't tell if it's actually a text mark that's been registered of simply their logo (which isn't a problem for you). While the search listing shows the text, the actual registration only shows the image. Perhaps someone who knows a little more about this than I can offer some advice...?

 

[The Byre]

No shortage of the use of the expression 'Tiny House' for a very long time -

http://tinyhouseblog.com/links/

 

[Deleted member 226268]

.

There is only a problem with this.... if you insist on labelling your new company
with words that contain " tiny house "

Why don't you think of another name that avoids this conflict completely ?

Use Micro-Maison or something similar description , but which describes your company equally well.

.

 

[cjd]

You could lodge an objection to the TM as purely descriptive - it seems that it is, but it's not obvious why the IPO allowed it to start with.