Register a trademark for furniture products in Vietnam?

1. What are trademarks for furniture products?

Trademarks for furniture products are unique signs that used to differentiate furniture products of your company from furniture products manufactured or sold by other companies or individuals in the market. These signs can be letters, pictures, logos or combinations of all these elements, designed in one or more colors.

Trademarks for furniture products are categorized into Class 20 according to the newest version of Nice Classification. Class 20 mostly includes furniture and parts therefor, as well as certain goods made of wood, cork, reed, cane, wicker, horn, bone, ivory, whalebone, shell, amber, mother-of-pearl, meerschaum and substitutes for all these materials, or of plastic; in particular:

- Metal furniture, camping furniture, gun racks, newspaper display rack;

- Indoor window blinds;

- Bedding, for example, cushions, spring cushions, pillows;

- Mirrors, mirrors for furniture and makeup;

- Non-metallic registration plates;

- Non-metallic hardware, such as bolts, screws, pins, wheels for furniture, pipe clamps;

- Mail boxes are not made of metal or construction materials.

This Class particularly excludes the following products:

- Special furniture for laboratories or for medical use;

- Outdoor blinds of metal, not of metal and not of textile, of textile;

- Bed linen, eiderdowns and sleeping bags;

- Certain mirrors for specific uses, for example, mirrors used in optical goods, mirrors used in surgery or dentistry, rearview mirrors, sighting mirrors for guns;

- Certain goods made of wood, cork, reed, cane, wicker, horn, bone, ivory, whalebone, shell, amber, mother-of-pearl, meerschaum and substitutes for all these materials, or of plastic, that are classified according to their function or purpose, for example, beads for making jewellery, wooden floor boards, baskets for domestic use, plastic cups, reed mats.

2. Why should you register trademarks for furniture products in Vietnam?

Furniture is a business market that brings high and stable profits to companies. In Vietnam, the number of companies doing business in this market is increasing more and more. In addition to the well-known furniture brands, there are many furniture products that do not have their own brands and customers cannot remember the products, thus affecting the revenue of the business. From this reason, we can see that trademark registration for furniture products is a very necessary procedure for companies if they want to do business and develop in a long term in the market.

Moreover, trademark registration will establish the legal basis for you to use your trademarks exclusively for your furniture products. If there is any company, organization or individual uses your registered trademark without the consent from you, you will have the rights to ask competent state agencies to handle such infringements.

After being use for furniture products in the market in a certain period of time, the trademark can become a famous trademark and you can sell the trademark or provide license for other entities to use it in order to make more profit for your company.

3. How to register trademarks for furniture products in Vietnam?

In order to register trademarks for furniture products according to the intellectual property law in Vietnam, the applicant shall prepare the following papers and documents:

- 02 copies of Declaration of trademark registration;

- 05 copies of Trademark samples (each sample does not exceed 80mm x 80 mm);

- List of products (or services) that accompanied by the trademark;

- Authorization letter (in case of applying through representative);

- Papers proving the payment of state charges and fees (in case of paying fees and charges via postal services or directly remit into accounts of the National Office of Intellectual Property);

4. Procedures of trademark registration for furniture products in Vietnam

The process of trademark registration for furniture products should follow the stages as below:

First stage: Trademark search

This procedure is not compulsory but it is necessary to check in advance if your trademark is similar to other trademarks that have been registered. There are two ways to search a trademark:

- Preliminary search: The trademarks are searched based on the data published by the NOIP and the World Intellectual Property Organization. However, these data usually are updated later than the actual number of trademarks in real-time, so they are incomplete and inaccurate. The processing time is normally from 1 day to 3 days.

- Advanced search: By this method, the trademark will be searched by the most experienced specialists in the field of intellectual property at the competent state agencies. The processing time is from 3 days to 7 days and the search results will be more accurate and complete than the first method.

Second stage: Trademark application submission

The applicant shall submit the trademark registration dossier to the official office of NOIP in Ha Noi or to one of its representative offices in Da Nang or Ho Chi Minh city. Besides, in case the applicant cannot apply directly in the above cities, the dossier can be submitted indirectly via post office or couriers.

Third stage: Appraisal of the form of application and publication the valid application

After receiving the trademark registration application, the NOIP shall process the trademark registration application through the following step:

First step: Evaluate the form of trademark registration

Trademark registration applications are formally appraised to assess the validity of applications in terms of necessary documents; classifying, right to apply,... In case the application is a valid application, the NOIP shall issue a notice of acceptance of a valid application. Time for this appraisal is from 01 to 02 months from the filing date.

Second step: Announcement of trademark registration application

A trademark registration application which has been accepted by the NOIP shall be published in the Industrial Property Gazette within 2 months from the date the application is accepted as a valid application.

Third step: Evaluate the content of the application

The validated trademark registration application will be appraised in terms of the content of the application. The purpose of this examination is to assess the ability to grant a certificate to the trademark stated in the application under the conditions of protection and to determine the scope of protection. The time limit for the examination of contents is 06 months from the date of publication.

Final stage: Issue of the certificate

If the trademark registration application meet all the prescribed conditions and the applicant pays all the fees fully and properly. The NOIP shall decide to grant protection title and record in the National Register of Industrial Property.

Time for issuing protection title is 01-02 months from the date of payment of certificate-granting fee.

5. Where to register trademarks for furniture products in Vietnam?

According to Vietnamese law, foreign companies and individuals cannot register trademarks for their products in Vietnam directly but have to register the trademarks via an official industrial property representative organization in Vietnam.

Minh Khue Law Firm is an official industrial property representative organization in Vietnam which was licensed since August 2017 with the representative code is 226. The Intellectual Property Department of Minh Khue Law Firm has registered successfully many trademarks for products and services of domestic as well as foreign clients.

Minh Khue Law Firm’s office address: Room 2007, C2 building, Vincom Tran Duy Hung, Trung Hoa ward, Cau Giay district, Ha Noi city.

The person in charge of the Intellectual Property Department of Minh Khue Law Firm:

Lawyer: To Thi Phuong Dzung

Email: dung@luatminhkhue.vn ;

Phone number: + 84986 386 648

The dossier will be submitted in: National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam, address at: 384-386 Nguyen Trai street, Thanh Xuan Trung ward, Thanh Xuan district, Hanoi.

You can refer to some trademarks for furniture products that were registered by Minh Khue Law Firm:

Fancy Trademark

Class 20: Accessories for bed assembly, not metal; bed; bed frame [wooden]; buffer.

IMASOFA Trademark

Class 20: settee chair; benches [furniture]; chair; cushion; display cabinet [furniture]; table.

6. Contact to register trademarks for furniture products in Vietnam

Please contact: Minh Khue Law Company Limited

Address: Room 2007, C2 building, Vincom Tran Duy Hung, Trung Hoa ward, Cau Giay district, Ha Noi city.

Phone number: + 84986 386 648 - Lawyer: To Thi Phuong Dzung

Email: dung@luatminhkhue.vn

Best Regards,

Intellectual Property Department - Minh Khue Law Company Limited