To obtain a federally registered trademark, the applicant is required to fill out and submit a trademark application to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, or USPTO. The trademark application will contain information about the applicant, the desired trademark, and the nature of the goods/services to be protected under the trademark. The USPTO examining attorney will then first evaluate the distinctiveness of the applicant's mark vis-a-vis the goods/services (if the trademark is not sufficiently distinct, it is not eligible for trademark protection) and then search the USPTO database to see if there are any trademarks which are too sufficiently similar to the applicant's, which would result in a conflict. In the event that the examining attorney approves the application, it will proceed to the Official Gazette for a 30 day period of “publication” upon which any third party with a legitimate claim against the filing can submit an “opposition” to the application. If no oppositions are submitted, the applicant's trademark application will be cleared for final registration.

Yes. If the aspiring owner of a trademark is not actually selling anything in conjunction with the clever name or slogan, the owner does not actually have a trademark – just a clever name or design. To obtain trademark protection, one must have first made a meaningful number of sales of the product/service under the banner of the trademark.

To obtain a Federal Trademark from the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), one must demonstrate that he/she has made bona fide sales (what qualifies as bona fide is unfortunately not so clear) in Inter-state commerce. This means that simply selling your product within your home-state is not good enough - you must be selling it across state lines.

Unfortunately, the USPTO has not to date provided an exact number of sales/money earned necessary to satisfy the In-Commerce requirement. Instead, the law provides that a "Bona-Fide" number of sales must have been made. Ultimately, use your judgment. A token sale of one t-shirt to a friend does not count as "Bona-Fide sales" but 100 t-shirts to multiple parties most likely would.

Yes, with an Intent-To-Use trademark application. Section 1(b) of the Lanham Act, 15.U.S.C. § 1051(b) states that “…person who has a bona fide intention, under circumstances showing the good faith of such person, to use a trademark in commerce may request registration of its trademark.” Once the ITU Trademark Application has been accepted and you have been issued a Notice of Allowance (NOA), you have six months to either submit your Statement of Use or file a petition to extend your submission of a Statement of Use. Each extension request will allow the applicant an additional six months to provide the Statement of Use. The applicant has the right to 5 extension requests.

In order to obtain a registered trademark, the trademark must be attached to a good or service that has been sold in Inter-State Commerce. What precisely does this mean? Well, in the case of goods, simply that the goods must be sold over State Lines and for services, simply that the service must be offered in multiple States.