Trademark Attorney in Buffalo, NY
Reviewed by Christopher H. Brown, Jr., Founding Partner | Roach, Lennon & Brown, PLLC | SUNY Buffalo Law School, J.D., cum laude | Admitted to practice in New York since 2015 | Last updated September 2026
A trademark is the word, logo, or phrase that tells customers a product or service comes from you and not a competitor. Registering it with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office gives your Buffalo business nationwide rights to stop others from using something confusingly similar, well beyond what you get just by using a name in your own neighborhood. Roach, Lennon & Brown helps Western New York businesses search, file, and defend trademarks, and register copyrights for the creative work behind those brands.
What Can Be Trademarked
Almost anything that identifies your business can be trademarked. A name, a logo, a slogan, a sound, even a color combination can qualify, as long as it is distinctive enough and not already claimed by someone else in a related field. What cannot be trademarked is a purely descriptive term everyone in your industry needs to use, or a mark that is confusingly close to one already registered.
How to Register a Trademark with the USPTO
Registering a trademark with the USPTO runs through several stages, and each one takes real time. It starts with a clearance search, checking the federal register and common law use for anything that could block your mark or create a fight down the road. Skipping this step is the single most common way a small business ends up rebranding a year into using a name.
Filing Fees Under the Current USPTO Fee Rule
Next comes the application itself, filed through the USPTO’s online system. As of the fee rule that took effect in January 2025, the base application fee is $350 per class of goods or services, with added surcharges of $100 per class for incomplete information, $200 per class for using the free-form description box instead of the USPTO’s pre-approved list, and $200 per class for every 1,000 characters past the first in that description. Filing a clean, complete application in the right class avoids these surcharges entirely.
Examination, Office Actions, and Publication
Once filed, your application waits for an examining attorney. The USPTO’s current target is 5 months from filing to that first review, though it can run faster or slower depending on filing volume. If the examiner finds a problem, you get an Office Action and generally 3 months to respond, extendable to 6. If the mark clears review, it publishes in the Official Gazette for a 30 day window where anyone can oppose it.
Total Timeline and Ongoing Maintenance
Add it all up, and the USPTO’s own target for total pendency is 11 months or less for a straightforward case, and 14 months on average once you include applications that get suspended or opposed. Registration is not the finish line either. Between the fifth and sixth year after registration, you must file a declaration of use to keep the mark alive. Starting in year nine, you can file a ten year renewal, and then again every ten years after that indefinitely, as long as you keep using the mark in commerce.
Trademark Enforcement: What Happens If Someone Infringes
If a registered trademark still gets copied, the owner has more to work with than an unregistered one. Depending on the case, remedies can include an injunction stopping further use, the infringer’s profits from using your mark, your actual damages, and in cases of willful or fraudulent infringement, attorney’s fees.
Why Work With a Buffalo Trademark Attorney
Buffalo businesses searching for trademark help online will run into a lot of national filing services that bid on “Buffalo trademark attorney” without a single attorney in Western New York. That works fine for a straightforward filing, but it means no one who can sit across the table from you, walk through your specific brand and industry, or show up if a dispute turns into litigation. Christopher H. Brown, Jr., a founding partner at Roach, Lennon & Brown, has been admitted to practice in New York since 2015 and works alongside the firm’s Business & Corporate team on trademark, copyright, and trade secret matters for Buffalo and Niagara Falls clients. If your brand also needs to be built into a new business entity, our team can coordinate the formation and the trademark filing together.
Frequently Asked Questions
What can be trademarked?
A name, logo, slogan, sound, or even a color combination can be trademarked, as long as it distinguishes your goods or services from a competitor’s and is not already claimed by someone else in a related field. Purely descriptive terms that everyone in an industry needs to use generally cannot be registered on their own.
How much does it cost to register a trademark in 2026?
The USPTO’s base application fee is $350 per class of goods or services, under the fee rule that took effect in January 2025. Surcharges of $100 to $200 per class apply if the application is incomplete or uses a free-form description instead of the USPTO’s approved list, so a clean application in the right class keeps costs down.
How long does trademark registration take?
The USPTO’s current target is 5 months from filing to the first examining attorney review, and 11 months or less for total pendency on a straightforward case. Applications that receive an Office Action, get opposed, or are otherwise suspended can take considerably longer, with an average closer to 14 months across all applications.
What happens if the USPTO issues an office action?
An Office Action is a letter identifying a legal or procedural problem with your application, and you generally have 3 months to respond, extendable to 6. Common issues include a likelihood of confusion with an existing mark, a description that is too vague, or a mark the examiner considers merely descriptive.
Do I need a lawyer to file a trademark application?
The USPTO does not require an attorney for a US-based applicant, but the application asks you to make legal judgment calls, like which class covers your goods and services and how to describe them, that are hard to get right without experience. Mistakes here are a common reason applications draw an Office Action or lose rights they could have kept.
What is the difference between a trademark and a copyright?
A trademark protects a brand identifier, like a name or logo, that distinguishes your goods or services in the marketplace. A copyright protects an original creative work, like writing, photography, or software code, once it is fixed in a tangible form. Many businesses need both: a trademark for the brand and a copyright for the marketing materials built around it.
What happens if someone infringes my trademark?
Remedies can include an injunction stopping the infringing use, the infringer’s profits earned from the use, your own actual damages, and in cases of willful or fraudulent infringement, attorney’s fees. A federal registration also gives you a legal presumption of ownership and the exclusive right to use the mark nationwide, which makes these claims easier to bring.
Do I have to renew my trademark?
Yes. You must file a declaration of use between the fifth and sixth year after registration to keep the mark alive, then a ten year renewal starting in year nine, and again every ten years after that, as long as you are still using the mark in commerce. Missing these deadlines can cause the registration to be canceled.
Can I trademark my business name if I already formed an LLC with that name?
Forming an LLC only registers your name with New York’s Department of State for corporate purposes; it does not give you trademark rights or stop someone else from registering a similar mark for similar goods or services. A federal trademark search and application is a separate step, and the sooner it happens after formation, the less time a conflicting mark has to get registered first.
Should I hire a local Buffalo trademark attorney or a national filing service?
A national filing service can handle a simple, uncontested application at a lower upfront cost. A local attorney who can meet with you in person becomes valuable once your situation involves a close call on distinctiveness, a competitor with a similar mark, an Office Action that needs a real legal argument, or the possibility the registration turns into a dispute.
Talk to a Buffalo Trademark Attorney
Free Consultation. Call (716) 235-3025 or reach us through our contact page to start protecting your brand.
ATTORNEY ADVERTISING. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. No information on this page should be construed as legal advice from Roach, Lennon & Brown, PLLC, nor is it intended to be a substitute for legal counsel on any subject matter. This page does not create an attorney-client relationship.
