Beware of flags in trademark registrations!

Although it is possible to include images in a trademark application, care should be taken when images represent flags or state emblems. Legislation prohibits the registration and use of trademarks that include official signs. Thus, if you register a trademark including the tricolor flag, you risk receiving a categorical refusal from the INPI.

Flags: protected emblems

Article 6ter of the Paris Convention provides that " the countries of the Union agree to refuse or invalidate the registration and to prohibit, by appropriate measures, the use, without authorization from the competent authorities, either as trademarks or as elements of such trademarks, of armorial bearings, flags and other State emblems of the countries of the Union, official signs and hallmarks indicating control and warranty adopted by them, as well as any imitation from the heraldic point of view. »

This text therefore lays down the principle of the prohibition of registering a trademark comprising flags or other State emblems. On the one hand, this is to prevent a person from appropriating a monopoly on these emblems. Indeed, such a registration would infringe the sovereignty of the State. On the other hand, a trademark registration including a flag could be misleading. This would be the case if the application led the public to believe that the goods and services in question had a given geographical origin.

It should be noted that the ban applies both to the reproduction of flags and to their imitation.

Marks refused because of flags

Not surprisingly, the following trademarks were refused by INPI or EUIPO (the European Trademark Office) because they included flags :

Note that the size of the flag within the mark is indifferent. As soon as it is legible and perceptible, the mark may be refused by the Office concerned.

In addition, the figurative element may differ from the original flag. It may be stylized, or it may appear only in part. It is the examiner who will assess whether or not the mark can be registered.

Finally, it should be noted that the prohibition concerns any unauthorised use. It does not matter whether the depositor is a public body or a political party. Thus, the INPI had rejected, in part, the following trademark application:

For the Paris Court of Appeal : « The eye will thus immediately notice in the contested sign as registered a design imitating the French flag, it being noted that the verbal elements (Les Républicains) which refer to persons belonging to a republic can only reinforce this visual impression of a representation in the registered sign of an emblem of France, a country constituting a republican State. »

Conclusion: styling to register your trademark

If it is not possible to incorporate an image of a flag in its trademark, there is nothing to prevent the use of flag elements. For example, it is possible to use the colours blue-white-red, but they must not evoke the French flag.

The following marks could therefore be registered:

These marks have not been rejected, either because the shape of the original flags is not found or because they are sufficiently stylized to deviate from the original, and by filing in black and white, the risk of infringing Article 6ter of the Paris Convention is reduced.

Finally, it is important to recall that this prohibition also applies to other symbols or emblems, like the Olympic rings or the "€" symbol.

In any case, if you wish to register your trademark " MADE IN FRANCE "and avoid any rejection during the exam, follow our advice and don't hesitate to be accompanied!

Source of the logos: official publications of the INPI and the EUIPO