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Ms. Tabitha Brown!
Meet America’s New Mom! An actress, vegan food vlogger and TikTok sensation!
With a sweet calming voice paired with a Southern accent, she charms the world with her vegan recipe videos and family oriented moments. I mean have you seen the carrot bacon?? (I still have to try it!) If you seen some of her videos, you probably have heard her say “Like So, Like That” and “Cause That’s Yo’ Business!”. If you haven’t heard her say the phrases, click the video to hear:
With these phrases, she reaffirms that you can have your own way of cooking and personal style in the kitchen. Now thinking from a legal perspective, I thought about these two phrases and wondered if she could get a trademark.
According to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, a trademark is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. Some examples of work that may be trademarked are:
Business name
Business logo
T- shirt brand
Signature event title
Stage name
Blog/ podcast title
App name
Slogan/ tagline
Catch phrase
Title of Book Series
Product Name
Nonprofit Name
Program Title
The two phrases, “Like So, Like That” and “Cause that Yo Business” can fall under the category catch phrase. A catch phrase is a sentence or phrase, especially one that is associated with a particular famous person. Tabitha Brown can be defined as a public figure. She is a social media personality who has a certain social position and a significant influence. These two phrases are heavily associated with her image because she repeatedly says them in her videos.
Examples of trademarked phrases that you may be familiar with are below:
Walt Disney and “Hakuna Matata”
Paris Hilton and “That’s Hot”
Taylor Swift and “Cause We Never Go Out Of Style”
Trademark ownership can provide exclusivity for merchandising. In the event someone is infringing on your rights or gaining a profit off of your trademark, you have legal grounds to prevent further unauthorized use of the trademark. In some situations, you may be entitled to compensation from the unauthorized use.
As for Tabitha Brown, a trademark application for the phrase “Like So Like That” has been filed on May 20, 2020. Yay! Go Tabitha!
Until next time,
Lawyer Jas