Will they?
Here’s the 3 parts of Trademark Engine operation.
A 3 part structure allows the friendly, but sheltered Trademark Engine sales staff to stay in their bubble of bliss. Stay positive. People like working there. There are 80 people taking calls, per one of the manager’s claim on LinkedIn. Their goal is to send callers back to the web page to order. Nothing more.IF you ask a Swyft Filings staff member about trademarks, they will send you back to Trademark Engine. It seems Swyft Legal is there to reply to USPTO Office Action refusals. This is where their 1 attorney seems to be. After a month of trying we could never get a live person to talk to.
All 3 entities were founded and operated as managing member by Travis S. Crabtree. Mr. Crabtree was personally ordered by the OED Office of Enrollment and Discipline Director from practicing law before the USPTO for violating Rules of Professional Conduct. See: https://foiadocuments.uspto.
1) TRADEMARK ENGINE.
This is the sales team. Their ubiquitous PPC ads offer an extremely low price of just $99. Trademark Engine are always be at the top of the internet search engines. In 2021, reporter Tim Lince of WTR World Trademark Report estimated, using SpyFu, that Trademark Engine spends $43,200 a month on pay per click ads.It is unclear if this expenditure is for all 3 of their entities described here. See https://www.worldtrademarkreview.com/data/wtr-investigation-exclusives/wtr-investigation-exclusives/article/revealed-how-controversial-low-cost-online-trademark-platforms-dominate-paid-google-search-results.
Yes, for $99 a direct hit search of the USPTO is said to be offered, but with no assistance for trademark attorney analysis. This is a 1% search. When a trademark is ordered, you will find yourself filing out the application yourself. Then in a day or two you will automatically filed with the USPTO. Trademark Engine says they will correct grammar and typos, but much more is needed.
The USPTO expects applications to be filed out in a uniform way. Class descriptions must be exact. Bad applications create needless USPTO office action refusals. I have seen many poorly completed Trademark Engine applications. In a way this whole offering is worthless because you can do a direct hit search the USPTO yourself, and mangle your own filing. All for free.
For $149 the second Trademark Engine trademark package includes: A) a cease and desist form letter, B) a trademark assignment form and C) lifetime support.
Using a form letter for a cease and desist is naive. It tells people you have no $. They will ignore you. If a letter is sent, it better to be from an actual trademark attorney. If you drop the issue, because they told you to get lost or ignore you, then it is called acquiescence. You give up your I.P. rights, slowly. See an attorney about this issue.
Strategy is needed, not a form letter. Secondly, a trademark assignment form is of dubious benefit because hardly anyone will ever need it. As to lifetime support, I can attest that from literally dozens of calls, the few Trademark Engine staff members we could ever reach, knew very little about trademarks.
2) SWYFT FILINGS.
LLC’s, C-Corps. S-Corps, non-profit and DBA’s are also filed. For trademarks though, the Trademark Engine sales staff is sheltered from the application staff. Different name. Different office. It’s unclear if they talk to each other. Maybe the managers might. Oddly, they give each other’s phone #’s out.Representatives will explain, “We are the same company, but Trademark Engine does trademarks, we do filings”. Moreover, they stress that they do not have attorneys, nor does Trademark Engine. They also stress “Support people are not lawyers and cannot give legal advice”. Yes, non-attorneys should not give legal advice, BUT this misses the point.
The need for a basic trademark consultation, which can answer 90% of a client’s questions is completely shirked. A blend of both consultations and legal advice is needed to do a successful trademark application. Like for example, EVERY trademark filing should be based upon a COMPREHENSIVE LEGAL TRADEMARK and COMMON LAW RESEARCH. Fundamental practice. See: https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/search/comprehensive-clearance-search-similar-trademarks.
Then for $399, (for the past year, from what I can surmise), Trademark Engine now offers comprehensive research. That’s the music we long to hear! But, not so fast – again – too good to be true! Trademark Engine‘s “comprehensive research”, turns out to be a mere 11 pages, as we were told by one of their top managers. It was no easy feat to get past the front line of 80 in home workers, who give minimal information before sending you back to their well done web site. See trademarkengine.com.
Trademark attorney Morris Turek has a YouTube video about the Trademark Engine packages. See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?
The “rope-a-dope’ Trademark Engine scheme is to trick new business owners into thinking trademarks are really simple to do. They are not. Expertise is needed. Comprehensive trademark legal research, applications and attorney time, usually add up to about 10 hours of work. There are paid database costs too. Telling people what they want to hear, to get a sale, instead of the whole story is fraud.
Being in business since 2016, Trademark Engine has seen enough of their client’s trademark applications damaged. There is no way they haven’t. At their high volume, I estimate they have multiple crisis situations every day. They see the USPTO office action refusals, from likelihood-of-confusions, to bad specimens, to incoherent goods/services descriptions, merely descriptive marks which should have never been filed to the cease and desist orders from people with prior rights under Common Law. After, all to cut costs and create deniability, their trademark applications are automated.
3) SWYFT LEGAL.
The attorney(s), they say the have, never answer the phone. I found 1 attorney associated with Swyft Legal. As of February 22, 2024 she has a mere 241 trademark filings at the USPTO. Try calling their sister company, Swyft Legal yourself @ 520-412-9462.—————
ARE THE NAMES SWYFT LEGAL AND SWYFT FILINGS EACH LEGALLY CLEAR? NO THEY ARE NOT.
Last but not least, the name Swyft Legal is infringing upon the name Swift Legal of Redwood City, who has Common Law rights since 1976. Swyft Legal started in 2021/2022. See https://web.archive.org/web/So hey, Trademark Engine – if you need a trademark attorney – to explain why Swyft Legal and Swyft Filings are probably infringing upon Swift Legal of Redwood City – TradeMark Express has 12 trademark attorneys who offer free legal advice to our clients. Next time remember do comprehensive Trademark and Common Law legal research BEFORE you start your businesses. Call us!
NOTE to Trademark Engine – In case you are name brainstorming, trying to add a new word to precede both Swyft Legal and Swyft Filings, do not use the word TAYLOR. Bad idea!
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Here are the first and second posts in case you missed either one:
https://tmexpress.com/trademarkengine-1of3-022224/ and https://tmexpress.com/trademarkengine-2of3-030424/
Yes we have spent way too much time on this.
I send this with the goal of “fair play” and “good faith”.
Trademark Engine, please improve your services to meet the needs of your clients.
After 8 years, 40,000 trademarks handled, you know what this really means.
Hope this helps you in choosing your next trademarking service.
Choose TradeMark Express!