Trademark Clearance and Filing

Your name goes on your signs, your packaging, your website, and your reputation. Before you build on it, it pays to know whether someone else already has a claim to it. That is what clearance is for. If the answer supports it, I can then file your federal application.

A team arranging sticky notes on a glass wall.

Why clearance comes before filing

Filing an application does not tell you whether a name is safe to use. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office can refuse a mark that is too close to an earlier one, or that simply describes your goods or services, and that refusal can come months after you file. A business that used a similar name first may also have rights even if it never registered. Clearance looks for these problems up front, when changing course costs the least.

What a clearance search looks at

Federal registrations and pending applications.
State trademark registrations.
Common-law use: businesses using a similar name without registering it.

I then weigh what the search turns up: how close the marks look, sound, and mean, how related the goods or services are, and how distinctive your mark is.

What you get from clearance

A documented search of federal, state, and common-law sources for one ordinary word mark.
A dated written assessment of what I found and what it means for your mark.
A decision meeting where we go over your options.

Clearance assesses risk; a search cannot guarantee availability, registration, or freedom from every claim.

The Federal Application

If clearance supports it, I can file one ordinary federal application for one mark in one class.

Included: routine corrections, correspondence with the Trademark Office, and tracking deadlines.
Not included: responding to a substantive refusal, appeals, oppositions, cancellations, or other disputes.

Later filings, such as proof of use, are separate.

Fees

Clearance search and assessment: $750.

Federal application: $750, charged only if you authorize filing after clearance.

Government filing fees are separate. As of October 23, 2026, the USPTO base application fee is $350 per class of goods or services. Additional USPTO fees can apply in some cases, and I confirm the exact amount before you authorize filing.

Example total for one mark in one class: $750 clearance + $750 federal application + $350 USPTO base fee = $1,850 if you go ahead with filing, before any additional USPTO fees or later work. If clearance shows the name is too risky, you pay only the $750.

Have a name in mind? Get in touch.