Trademark ‘bullying’ — it’s a thing

Many big colleges fiercely protecting their brands

Never get between a university and its trademarks.

That’s the lesson dozens of people learn every year when they unwittingly provoke the wrath of big universities and the lawyers they hire to protect their mascots, slogans and logos.

Records gathered by The Associated Press show that some major universities send their lawyers after even slight perceived threats to their brands, sending flurries of letters threatening legal action or trying to block new trademarks deemed too close to their own.

Schools say they’re only defending themselves from merchandise counterfeiters and others looking to exploit their brands for personal gain. But some legal experts say it often amounts to trademark bullying, a term used when bigger institutions use aggressive tactics to overpower their opponents in seemingly frivolous disputes.

And according to some lawyers, it appears to be getting more common. As the biggest universities bring in growing sums of money through licensing deals that rely on their brands, some are becoming increasingly aggressive in their efforts to protect their symbols.

“Universities for many years didn’t even register trademarks or really care about branding,” said David Ludwig, a Virginia trademark lawyer, noting that things changed after a “brand awareness awakening” in the 2000s. “Now a lot of big universities, especially ones in the major sports leagues, are kind of on par with your Coca-Colas in terms of their enforcing.”

The Associated Press reviewed dozens of disputes detailed in records obtained from universities and from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. A look at a few of them:

GERRY BROOME/AP North Carolina State has forced at least two other schools to stop using the Wolfpack as their athletic mascot nickname.

ROBERT F. BUKATY/AP Kirk Duke, whose family runs a Napa Valley winery called Duke's Folly, poses with bottles of wine at his home in Falmouth, Maine. The business was recently blocked from getting a trademark after Duke University intervened, saying it would lead to confusion with the school.