How Much Does Trade Mark Protection Cost?

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Table of Contents

• What is a Trade Mark?
• Classes of Goods or Services
• Trade Mark Application Costs – IP Australia
• The Cost of Not Applying to Protect Your Brand
• Key Takeaways
• Frequently Asked Questions

As a business owner, you may have heard about the importance of protecting your brand through trade mark registration. You may also be wondering how much it costs to apply for a trade mark registration and whether this is something you can justify at this point in your business. This article will discuss the cost of registering a trade mark in Australia. It will also discuss the potential cost and detriment of not applying for this protection.

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What is a Trade Mark?

A trade mark is a sign or symbol you can use to represent your business in the market. Most common trade marks include business names and logos. Other examples include, but are not limited: 

• slogans; 
• icons; 
• shapes; 
• colours; and 
• sounds.

Classes of Goods or Services

An essential part of the trade mark application process is determining the goods and services relevant to your trade mark. IP Australia categorises goods and services into 45 classes. You must select the goods and services you provide or intend to provide under the trade mark from these classes. 

IP Australia’s goods and services search is a great tool to determine what classes may be relevant for you. 

Importantly, the cost of your trade mark application will depend on the number of classes you wish to include.

Trade Mark Application Costs – IP Australia

When applying for trade mark protection, you must pay government fees to IP Australia on a per-class, per-application basis. The price of the application will also depend upon the method of filing as follows:

The TM Headstart request is similar to a test application in that an IP Australia examiner will provide their preliminary thoughts on your application. If the examiner indicates that they are likely to raise an initial objection to your application, you can consider whether you would like to proceed with the formal application given this feedback. 

If you abandon your application after the Headstart stage, the fees payable are $200 per class (as opposed to $330 per class). However, the TM Headstart is not a mandatory process, and you may choose to go straight to the formal application. Your trade mark will then be formally examined within 4-5 months.

The above fees also assume that your application includes only ‘pre-approved’ descriptions from IP Australia’s picklist of goods and services. If you wish to include tailored descriptions of your goods/services, filing a ‘bespoke’ (non-picklist) application may be more appropriate. The fees for this option will be $400 per class, per application. It is worth noting that bespoke applications do not have the benefit of a Headstart assessment.

The Cost of Not Applying to Protect Your Brand

While you may view the application cost as a considerable financial commitment, you must also consider the potential cost of not protecting your brand. 

For example, if you come across a business that is copying your brand and do not have registered trade mark rights, enforcing your unregistered trade mark rights is significantly more costly and challenging.

As such, we recommend you prioritising trade mark protection as soon as possible. This will put your business in a stronger position if you encounter someone copying your brand.

Key Takeaways

If you are considering applying for a trade mark but are unsure how much the associated costs would be, a good starting point is to determine how many classes of goods/services are relevant for the trade mark. From there, you can calculate the fees payable to IP Australia. Additional fees may be payable if you would like to engage legal assistance with your application. However, LegalVision’s experienced intellectual property lawyers can assist you with preparing and filing your Australian trade mark applications as part of your LegalVision Pro membership. Call us today on 1300 544 755 or visit our membership page.

Frequently Asked Questions