How to Register a Logo: All the Useful Information?

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The logo is the business card and the distinctive element of each activity. For this reason, it is important to learn the whole process of How to register a logo. And to know how much to spend on registration.

How do you recognize your favorite brand? From the product, of course, but also from another detail that should not be underestimated: the logo. The logo is the element that distinguishes a company from everything else, both similar and competing brands.

So, if you are about to start your business, the first element to consider is the creation of the logo, a unique and inimitable distinctive sign. Find out how to do it and why it is important to create it!

Register a logo: why it matters

The logo is a bit like your business card. Inside there is the name of your business, a hint to the graphic layout that you will more or less useful in your online channels, and, in some cases, a reference to the sector you will be managing. But to make your logo official in all respects it is necessary to register it. Because? Here are a number of important reasons:

Right of exclusivity in the use of the logo
Prevent third-party companies from appropriating the logo
Ability to give the logo a commercial value
Possibility to sell the logo
Possibility to grant the use of the logo to others
Right to take legal action against those who use or appropriate the logo
Registration of the logo or trademark
Logo Design Services

A clarification to make before understanding how to register a logo is to deepen the terminological difference between logo and brand. In reality, when we take action to “register a logo” in reality, legally, we mean “to register a trademark”. And the trademarks to be registered can be of 3 types:

Verbal trademark registration: protects only the words of the logo and not the graphics
Graphic trademark registration: protects only the graphics of the logo but not the words
Mixed trademark registration: protects both the words and the graphics of the logo

Registration of a logo: preliminary actions

Before registering your logo it is necessary to activate some preliminary actions.

In the first instance, obviously, it is necessary to check whether a logo has already been registered, or if there are the same or similar logos that have not already been registered. In the case of the presence of a similar or identical logo, it is advisable to change the logo.

To get a complete overview, however, it is good not to rely only on free databases. In fact, this research only returns partial results, relating only to Italy and not to the rest of the world, and above all it intercepts only brands that are the same as their own and not similar.

Which, it is fair to remember, could lead to the refusal of the practice or to the registration of a logo similar or similar to others, with the attached risk of requesting damages. Secondly, it is necessary to make sure that the logo does not hide negative connotations, that is, it is not contrary to morals or public order.

How to register a logo step by step?

After evaluating the availability of the chosen logo, both graphically and verbally, it is very important to move on to choosing the protection classes of your logo. It should be remembered that the protection will only act for the classes specified in the registration application.

In this sense, it is important for those who register the brand to have a little visionary spirit and to be able to imagine the future markets of their brand, so as to be safe from abuse and counterfeiting. Once the classes have been defined, the registration form is completed, in which the following are to be inserted:

The personal data of the registration applicant
The classes chose to protect the logo
The reproduction of the logo itself

After carefully entering these data, you must send the completed form to the Italian Patent and Trademark Office, via the territorial secretariat of the Chamber of Commerce or, if in possession of an electronic signature, electronically.

How much it costs to register a logo?

The registration of a logo involves both fixed and variable costs; the latter depends on the number of classes chosen and the number of States in which the logo is to be registered.

These are the fixed costs :

$ 40.00 secretarial fees if the application is filed with the Chamber of Commerce
40.00$ secretarial fee if the application is sent by registered mail with a return receipt
$ 101.00 for registration of the logo in a classroom
$ 16.00 revenue stamp

Among the variable costs it is worth noting the share of 34,00 $ for each class in addition to the main, and the change from $ 101.00 to $ 337.00 if instead of a single logo you opt for a collective logo.

As regards the registration of the logo at the Community level, the costs are:

$ 850.00 for a single class
50$ for the second class
$ 150 to add other classes