PAGE 6
AUGUST, 1958
Company Trademarks Are Priceless Possessions
Th^ Identify Products, Pkdge
Manufacturer's Integrity
Let’s suppose you go into a store to buy an item of
merchandise. Among the items for sale are those bearing
well-known names. There are others with relatively un
known labels.
Which would you buy? Chances are you would choose
the item with the name most familiar to you. And you would
be putting to work a common principle of human behavior.
The consumer todays buys the item with a label or trade
mark with which he is acquainted.
Trademarks — those magic
words or designs which you see
in newspaper and magazine ad
vertising, on television or
through other media—influence
our buying habits considerably.
Trademarks are one of the
easiest and best means that pur
chasers have for identifying and
selecting Firestone products. The
trademarks also assure the con
sumer that the company’s good
reputation stands behind the
products which it places on the
market.
Manufacturers give special at
tention to the use and appear
ance of their trademarks, be
cause these magic words or de
signs are among the most impor
tant salesmen a company can
have.
Firestone employees work
toward turning out tires, steel
products, synthetic rubber,
plastics, textiles and many other
products. As an employee, are
you familiar with the trade
marks of company products, of
the identifying marks of the
hundreds of other items which
Firestone produces and sells?
AS OF JULY, 1958, the com
pany owned 157 trademarks, all
registered in the U. S. Patent
Office. There are 35 separate
registrations for the trademark
“FIRESTONE” alone, covering
a variety of products in addition
to tires. This list includes
vacuum bottles, ash trays, bi
cycles, rims, batteries, spark
plugs, ice skates, washing ma
chines, fountain pens, raincoats
and radios.
Trademarks, which give the
Firestone customer assurance of
high quality in what he buys,
are not limited to the United
States. The company has regis
trations in almost every nation
of the world.
A trademark can take differ
ent forms and appearances, so
long as it identifies and distin
guishes the products of its own
er from the products of others.
Today, trademarks can be sym
bols, designs, words or numbers.
Many of the Firestone-owned
trademarks are words printed in
block letters. “GUM DIPPED”
and “VELON” and several others
are printed in script. There is the
number trademark “500” for the
nylon passenger tire; the letter
trademark “FR-S” for our syn
thetic rubber, and the character
istic “F” medallion for many
different products.
THE MOST important of all is
the trademark “FIRESTONE” in
its familiar Old English lettering.
This has been in use by the com
pany since 1905 when it appear
ed on company advertising blot
ters.
Without trademarks, advertis
ing would be stripped of its ef
fectiveness, because there would
be no way to direct the attention
of the buying public to such
merchandise as “TOWN AND
COUNTRY” tires, “VELON”,
“CONTRO”, or any of the many
other products the company puts
on the market.
People sometimes confuse
trademarks with patents and
copyrights. A copyright protects
artistic creations, such as books,
photographs, musical composi
tions and paintings. A patent
gives legal protection to an in
vention.
GROUND GRIP traction
YOU'LL FIND IT WITH
BU
TAPRENE
EXMVAT08
De luxe Champion
The Firestone company owns 157 trademarks,
all registered in the United States Patent Office.
There are 35 separate registrations for the trade
mark "Firestone" alone, covering a host of prod
ucts in addition to tires.
EXCLUSIVE right to use a
trademark comes only through
the first and continued use in
connection with actual sales of
goods and not from registration.
Similar to a birth certificate, a
registration creates nothing; it
only provides an official recogni
tion of what has already been
created. Thus we see trademarks
are valuable but can be easily
lost if not kept in continuous
use.
Some people have the mis
guided opinion that it would be
a good thing for a company’s
trademark to become the com
mon word for a product—what
advertisers call a “generic term”.
When this happens, the owner
loses his trademark forever,
since everyone else gains the
right to use the same term to
identify the product. “Aspirin”
and “Cellophane” are familiar
examples of trademarks that
were lost because they became
common names — and public
property.
For this reason, many owners
always place the common name
of the product after their trade
marks. Thus our material for
bonding rubber to metal would
be advertised or used as
“LOXITE” cement.
Trademarks are most valuable
and can exist forever if used ex
clusively and if cared for prop
erly. Proper care includes
printing the word in a distinc
tive manner and setting it off
from other printed words.
THE SYMBOL of a capital
“R” inside a small circle and
placed after a trademark is pub
lic notice that the trademark is
registered in the U.S. Patent Of
fice. If the trademark is not
registered, the owner can give
notice of his trademark rights
by printing the letters “T.M.” or
the word “Trademark” as a foot
note.
When a company uses one
trademark in conjunction with
another of its marks the lesser-
known trademark may have
trouble making itself known. It
is much like the family with an
“All American” or a famous
personality belonging to it. Oth
er members of the family have
difficulty standing on their own.
This being so, the trademark
“AIRIDE” is far more effective
and will have a better chance of
becoming well-known if it is
printed “AIRIDE” by Firestone,
instead of “FIRESTONE
AIRIDE.” Too, “AIRIDE” by
Firestone informs the public that
there is only one kind of
“AIRIDE” spring, the product
manufactured and sold by Fire
stone.
TRADEMARKS, representing
value beyond appraisal, stand
for our company’s reputation.
They guarantee high standards
of quality, and help the public to
recognize and choose our prod
ucts.
Every employee may well
take pride in guarding the com
pany’s trademarks, in watching
that others do not infringe upon
their use. Once the ownership of
a trademark is lost, so are all the
distinctions and prestige which
the company and its employees
have worked hard to gain.
Textiles Lead Industry In Southeast
By far, textiles remain the No. 1 industry in the South
east, with annual production totaling 2.4 billion dollars. Food
processing, a 1.2-billion-dollar-a-year industry, comes second,
followed by chemicals, lumber and wood products, primary
metals, apparel, pulp and paper.
North Carolina is the Southeast’s leading industrial state,
with an annual output worth 2.6 billion dollars.
FIRESTONE TEXTILES
P. O. BOX 551
GASTONIA. N. C.
SEC. 34.66 P. L. & R.
U. S. POSTAGE
PAID
GASTONIA, N. C.
PERMIT NO. 29
As a trademark, the word Firestone in the distinctive Old
English lettering has been in use since 1905. This Cadillac, built
just five years later, today sports Firestone Non-Skid tires, size
34 X 4. A spare is a Firestone "Cord" with "shamrock" tread design.
Louise Nall and Jack York look over one of the tires of the 17th
set put in service since W. Z. Plyler of Gastonia bought the horse
less carriage in 1913. Louise's father, Lacy R. Nall, works in cord
Weaving; her mother in rayon Twisting. Jack's parents, Mr. and
Mrs. W. J. York, both work in Spooling.
Form 3547 Requested