Does my poo have to pay royalties to UPS?

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ALL YOUR BROWN ARE BELONG TO US

Get this: my wife just discovered that the UPS corporation has trademarked the color brown. Yes, you got that right. Go to their corporate homepage, and click on the "trademarks" link at the bottom. Download their trademarks PDF. You will find the following text on the front page:
Published by UPS Brand Management.
© Copyright 2003 United Parcel Service of America, Inc.
UPS, the UPS brandmark and the color brown are registered trademarks of United Parcel Service of America, Inc. All rights reserved.
Trademarks in the U.S.
2005-2007 United Parcel Service of America, Inc. Rev. 4/07
(emphasis added.) Looking inside, you can see some of the other terms they've trademarked:
Big Brown Truck®
Brown®
Color Brown®
Um, dude, that is totally wack.

Comments

Anonymous said…
That must explain last night's SNL sketch about fedexing faeces.
7:27 AM, June 25, 2007
Anthony said…
It's not as arbitrary as it seems. Trademark law requires that the trademark be enforceable only against a certain class or classes of goods. In UPS's case, it's probably Class 39 (Transportation and Storage).

Abbreviated list can be found here. http://www.oppedahl.com/trademarks/tmclasses.htm
2:14 PM, June 25, 2007
Zachary Drake said…
Thanks Anthony. So my stools are exempt, unless they try to start a package delivery service. Still, it seems like it wouldn't be hard for all the colors to get taken quickly. Then no one can enter the market unless their corporate logo is puce.
11:10 PM, June 25, 2007
Eric Nord said…
Fortunately, I don't have to worry about UPS... my poo is usually orange.
2:39 AM, December 22, 2007
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