Decisions · 85663950
In re Allegiance Staffing
Serial No. 85663950 · Decided 2015-07-09 · Section 2(d) Ex Parte Appeal
What happened
Refusal reversed — ALLEGIANCE STAFFING may register over ALLEGIS for identical staffing services because the familiar word ALLEGIANCE is readily distinguished from the coined term ALLEGIS, and the applicant’s own prior identical registration had coexisted with the ALLEGIS marks for eleven years without incident.
The marks
Applicant
ALLEGIANCE STAFFING
Temporary employment agency services provided to others, not including hospitals and healthcare providers
Cited registration
ALLEGIS
Employment agency services, namely, filling the temporary and permanent staffing needs of businesses; Employment hiring, recruiting, placement, staffing and career networking services; Executive recruiting services; Human capital management outsourcing services; Personnel management; Providing on-line employment information
How the marks compared
| Dimension | Finding | What the Board said |
|---|---|---|
| sound | Somewhat Similar | The marks share the ALLEGI- prefix. |
| appearance | Somewhat Similar | The shared prefix creates some visual similarity. |
| meaning | Dissimilar | ALLEGIANCE is a familiar English word conveying loyalty; ALLEGIS is a coined term with no meaning. |
| commercial impression | Dissimilar | The semantic difference outweighs the visual and phonetic overlap. |
The Board found the marks sufficiently dissimilar overall because consumers readily distinguish the familiar word ALLEGIANCE from the coined, meaningless ALLEGIS.
du Pont factors that bore on the outcome
| # | Factor | Weight | What the Board found |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Similarity of the marks | Favored Applicant | The familiar word ALLEGIANCE and the coined ALLEGIS convey different impressions despite the shared prefix. |
| 2 | Relatedness of the goods or services | Favored Refusal | The staffing services are legally identical. |
| 3 | Similarity of trade channels | Favored Refusal | Identical services are presumed to travel in the same channels. |
| 4 | Conditions of sale and buyer sophistication | Favored Applicant | Businesses selecting staffing providers exercise heightened care. |
| 6 | Number and nature of similar marks in use | Neutral | Third-party ALLEGIANCE registrations for unrelated goods were not probative. |
| 7 | Nature and extent of actual confusion | Neutral | No actual confusion, but limited geographic overlap gave the absence little weight. |
| 13 | Any other established fact probative of the effect of use | Dispositive — Favored Applicant | The applicant’s prior identical registration coexisted with eight ALLEGIS registrations for eleven years, showing the Office itself long saw no conflict. |
Why this decision is significant
Precedential reversal despite legally identical services, resting on the familiar-word-versus-coined-term distinction (ALLEGIANCE vs. ALLEGIS) and on DuPont factor 13: the applicant’s inadvertently lapsed identical registration had coexisted with eight ALLEGIS registrations for eleven years.
Research significance is Trademark Valet's editorial rating of how useful a decision is to practitioners. It is not a statement of precedential weight — that is the separate Precedential field, which comes from the Board.
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The original record
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