Decisions · 87134847
In re SnoWizard, Inc.
Serial No. 87134847 · Decided 2018-12-21 · Other
What happened
The Board refused to register the shape of a snowball vendor’s concession trailer (a snow-capped roof topped with a snowball and cup, plus the word SNOBALLS) as a trademark, because the trailer’s look is the design of the product itself, not packaging, and the company’s nine years of sales and a website photo did not prove customers actually recognize that roof design as identifying who makes the trailers.
The marks
Applicant
Three-dimensional configuration mark: a snow-capped roof with the word "SNOBALLS," a snowball and associated beverage container positioned on top of a concession trailer for snowball vendors (color not claimed; broken/dotted lines not part of the mark, showing position/placement only); sought under Section 2(f)
"Concession trailer for snowball vendors to operate a viable snowball business," in International Class 12
Why this decision is significant
Precedential decision applying the product-design/product-packaging distinction to an applicant’s own equipment (a concession trailer) and applying the Federal Circuit’s Converse six-factor acquired-distinctiveness test in the ex parte context, providing a detailed roadmap of what quantum of sales, use, and advertising evidence is (and is not) sufficient to prove secondary meaning for a product configuration mark.
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
Read the opinion and every filing on the Board's own docket. The summary above is our paraphrase, not a quotation from the opinion. The opinion is the authority.
Who checked this
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