Is A Descriptive Restaurant Name Desirable?

Restaurants like to adopt names that tell customers about the nature of the restaurant in some interesting way. But it can be difficult to register a descriptive name as a service mark.

A mark is merely descriptive if it immediately conveys knowledge of a quality, feature, function, or characteristic of the goods or services with which it is used. If your restaurant name is "merely descriptive," you cannot get exclusive rights to that name without proof that customers have come to recognize the name as identifying your restaurant and distinguishing it from others (known as acquiring "secondary meaning"). But if the name is "suggestive," it is considered inherently distinctive without further proof. The dividing line is thin.