The Splendid World Of Laudatory Trademarks

In a recent decision the General Court came to the interesting conclusion that a word of which the trademark consists shall not be deemed registrable, if it is descriptive and devoid of any distinctive character, although it is shown in a characteristic script form^[1] as for instance in the following form:

There is no doubt that the word SPLENDID is a word of the general English language which for almost all products and services is to be considered as descriptive with a laudatory aspect and which, as such, also lacks distinctive character. However, there exist innumerable CTMs which also consists of words of the general language which can be used in connection with most goods and services or at least with the goods and services for which the trademark is registered and they have been registered in the past on the theory that the distinctive character of the trademark can be based on the specific presentation and in many cases on a specific handwriting and script