This is not the result of a formal study, but many times we have asked clients with naming problems how much they have spent on legal fees before they called any naming agency. The number always seemed to be in the range of $6,000 to $8,000. Their own corporate lawyer had put some time in, then engaged trademark counsel, who had performed searches and checks and provided advice. Advice that basically said, go back to the drawing board and come up with some other name. Which clients had done, only to have the next round of names rejected too. Again and again. And when you consider a full name search and opinion from any respectable law firm is in the $1,500 to $3,000 price range (per name), the total expenditure can quickly grow.

We even checked in with the lawyers to see what they said. Guess what! One even told us of checking the exact same name three times for three different clients. Gravy money for them....especially when they knew the name had failed reasonable searches the first time. Lawyers are needed to do final name checks and provide legal counsel, advice and protection. They are the most expensive resource you can find for preliminary name checks......other than your own executives wasted time!!

One or two lawyers, of course, are suspicious of naming agencies because they say we are not lawyers and therefore are not qualified to do these searches. For final legal opinion they are right. And for some, small inexperienced agencies they are right too. But top professional naming agencies like Brighter Naming have people on staff who have worked with top law firms and been through the process a lot. We do initial screening, provisional clearance, advanced searches on all finalist names, and then provide clients with comprehensive search reports from the same legal research firms that your lawyer will use. In most cases, our client's lawyers work directly off the reports we give them.

They like the fact that we bring them clean business so they can do their job of registration. Of course, they get even more from a naming agency like ours as we also provide them our own additional research notes. In many other cases, we have helped clients interpret the cautionary notes they receive from their legal counsel. And all our services are built into one fixed price proposal. We do not run an expensive hourly clock like lawyers do!

Lawyers tell you what can go wrong. We can tell you what can go right! Plus we know marketing, image and linguistics too. See Saving Money with a Naming Agency for more details.

Looking for good trademark legal counsel? Please see the TM®esources section for the best of the best we have worked somewhere along the line.