The G&A Legal team has developed an effective and proven program to assist intellectual property rights owners in protecting their branded products. Our team custom-creates unique and comprehensive protective strategies for each client, in which we can monitor, research, and respond to brand threats as they arise.
Our team consists of brand protection experts with extensive investigative skills, using the latest technology, we’ve developed a system in which our team can carefully monitor your branded products and directly target infringers.
G&A Legal has established relationships with web auction and online sales companies including eBay, Yahoo, Amazon, Etsy, Zazzle, Overstock.com, trademe.co.nz, and sell.com. We have also worked with domestic and international customs authorities U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, local and national police, and the FBI to defend our clients’ intellectual property from infringement.
At G&A Legal, we customize our brand protection programs and services to meet the areas of protection that your unique products needs.
Options may include:
- Comprehensive daily internet searches which comb every corner of the web for potential infringements.
- Counterfeit product identification and removal. This includes U.S. and international investigation from web auctions and other third-party websites.
- Piracy protection for copyrighted intellectual property, including CDs, DVDS, or web content.
- “Grey market” identification and removal. Grey markets refer to the sale of true, authentic goods through illegal means.
- False Association identification and removal. This targets goods or services which falsely associate themselves with your brand through use of your brand’s name or likeness.
Brand Equity, Brand Threats, and Brand Protection
Brand equity refers to the value of a product or service’s market reputation. Brand equity is built up over time by the brand owner, who creates quality products and effectively markets them under the brand. When consumers see your product and correlate it with positive attributes, like superior quality, simply by the association with your brand, you’ve achieved a significant level of brand equity.
Brand threat refers to the potential or actual diminishment of brand equity. While it’s true that a brand owner can diminish his or her own brand equity through failure to produce quality goods or services, the biggest threats to brand equity come from third parties. Third parties attempt to capitalize off the brand equity that someone else worked hard to build up. They may produce counterfeit products, pirate copyrighted material, or sell their own products that are falsely associated with your brand. Brand threats come from many different sources, in many different forms.
Brand protection refers to actively seeking out and eliminating brand threats. Brand protection guards the value of your brand’s reputation.