The importance of making sure you are using your registered trade marks

It is a cornerstone of trade mark law that the owner of a registered trade mark must use the mark as registered, in relation to the relevant goods and/or services the mark is registered for. That being said, it is too often the case that a brand will overlook reconsidering its trade mark registrations when undergoing rebranding. As such, any trade mark registration for a logo which was obtained prior to a rebrand occurring may be vulnerable to a non-use removal application being made against it, especially in circumstances where the current trade mark is considered to be substantially different to that which was used by the brand previously.

As such, a similar situation was recently considered in Planet Plumbing SW Works Pty Ltd v Green Planet Maintenance Pty Ltd [2021] ATMO 32.