Intellectual property is the part of sourcing where prevention is spectacularly cheaper than remedy. A trademark application costs a few hundred dollars; recovering a brand name someone else registered first can cost more than the brand is worth, and sometimes cannot be done at all. This guide sets out the order of operations that keeps you out of that situation, and points to the official channels for each step.
Understand which right does what
Three separate rights protect three separate things, and they are commonly confused:
- Trademark — protects the name, logo and other source identifiers. This is the one that matters most for consumer brands, and it is the one most often lost by inaction.
- Design right / design patent — protects the appearance of a product. Time-sensitive: many jurisdictions require filing before public disclosure, and a product shown at a trade fair or listed for sale may already be disclosed.
- Patent (utility) — protects how something works. Expensive, slow, and only worth pursuing for genuinely novel function.
Copyright protects your photography, packaging artwork and written listing copy — automatically in most jurisdictions, but registration in the United States materially strengthens enforcement options.
The order of operations
1. Search before you name
Before printing anything, search the name in every market you plan to sell in. In the United States, the official trademark search system is at tmsearch.uspto.gov, and application status is at tsdr.uspto.gov. The old TESS interface has been retired; use the current search.
Search the classes you will actually sell in, and search for confusingly similar marks, not just exact matches. A name that is clear in one class may be blocked in another that covers your goods.
2. Register in the markets that matter — including China
Trademark rights are territorial. A US registration gives you nothing in China, and a Chinese registration gives you nothing in the US.
In the United States, file with the USPTO at uspto.gov. Applications are based either on actual use in commerce or on a bona fide intent to use.
In China, the point that surprises most first-time importers: China operates a first-to-file trademark system. Whoever files first generally owns the mark, regardless of who used it first elsewhere. The practical consequences are severe — a third party (sometimes an agent, a distributor, or a professional filer) can register your brand in China and then use that registration to block your factory from exporting goods bearing your own name.
Filing a Chinese trademark for a brand you manufacture in China is therefore not a luxury; it is part of the cost of manufacturing there. File in the relevant goods classes and consider filing a Chinese-character version of the mark, because that is what the market and the customs system will actually see.
Regional and international filing routes exist for filing in multiple countries from one application; a trademark attorney can advise which route fits your market list.
3. Contract before you send files
The agreement with your manufacturer should address, explicitly:
- Confidentiality — what information is confidential, for how long, and what happens on breach.
- Non-use — the factory may not use your designs, tooling or specifications for its own products.
- Non-circumvention — the factory may not sell your product directly to your customers or channels.
- Ownership of tooling, moulds and design files, stated unambiguously, along with where the tooling is stored and what happens to it if the relationship ends.
- Ownership of any improvements developed during the work.
- Governing law, language and dispute forum. This is the clause that decides whether the rest of the document is usable. An agreement enforceable in Chinese courts, written in Chinese, against the Chinese legal entity, is a different instrument from an English-language agreement pointing at a foreign forum. Which is appropriate depends on your situation and is a question for a lawyer experienced in China contracts — this page cannot answer it for you.
The commonly used shorthand for the confidentiality / non-use / non-circumvention combination is an NNN agreement, drafted for the China context rather than a translated Western NDA. The substance is what matters: obligations that a Chinese court could actually enforce against the entity that signed.
4. Control what you hand over
Contracts allocate liability after the fact. Information control reduces how often you need them.
- Compartmentalise. Where practical, split production so no single supplier holds every element of the finished product. This is standard for products with a distinctive component.
- Send what is needed, when it is needed. Full CAD, complete bills of material and vendor lists sent at quotation stage are the most commonly over-shared assets in sourcing.
- Own your tooling and know where it is. Tooling you paid for, stored at a factory that considers it theirs, is a negotiating weapon pointed at you.
- Keep brand assets on your own accounts. Domain registrations, marketplace seller accounts, social handles, and the master files of your photography and artwork stay under your control — not your agent’s, not your factory’s.
- Mark and log. Date-stamped design files, dated sample photographs and a written development record are the evidence base for any later claim of prior rights.
5. Register with the enforcement channels you will actually use
Rights are only useful through a channel:
- US Customs recordation. Registered US trademarks and copyrights can be recorded with CBP, which enables customs officers to detain infringing imports. The recordation system and guidance are reachable from cbp.gov.
- Marketplace brand programmes. Amazon Brand Registry and equivalent programmes on other marketplaces generally require a registered (or in some cases pending) trademark and are the practical mechanism for removing counterfeit listings and controlling your product detail pages. Registering the brand programme is usually the highest-return single action for an online seller after registration itself.
- Platform IP complaint systems. Chinese and international e-commerce platforms operate rights-holder complaint mechanisms; they require proof of the registration, which is why step 2 comes first.
- Chinese customs recordation. Trademark owners can record rights with Chinese customs to intercept infringing exports — relevant when someone else is shipping goods bearing your mark.
Trade fairs deserve their own paragraph
Showing an unregistered new design at a fair can constitute public disclosure that damages later design-right filings, and fairs are where designs get photographed and copied fastest. Practical hygiene: file design applications before the fair where the design is worth protecting; be deliberate about photography and specification sheets handed to strangers; and record what you showed and when. Our Canton Fair and sourcing trips guide covers the rest of the trip.
When something goes wrong
- Someone registered your mark first in China. Options may include opposition or invalidation proceedings, negotiation, or rebranding for that market. All are slow and all require local counsel. The lesson is directional: file early.
- Your factory is selling your product. Enforcement depends entirely on the contract you signed and where it can be enforced. Practical parallel steps: platform complaints, customs recordation, and moving production.
- Counterfeit listings on marketplaces. Brand registry takedowns are the fastest lever, then platform IP complaints, then legal action against sellers where the volume justifies it.
- Infringing imports. If your rights are recorded with customs, you have a channel; if they are not, you do not.
The short version
- Search the name before you print anything.
- Register the trademark in the markets you sell in and in China, where first-to-file rules.
- Sign a China-appropriate confidentiality / non-use / non-circumvention agreement with the entity that actually manufactures.
- State tooling and file ownership in writing, and know where the tooling is.
- Share the minimum viable information, as late as practical.
- Record rights with customs and register with marketplace brand programmes.
- Keep dated records of everything you designed and when you designed it.
This guide is general information about how IP protection works in practice for importers. It is not legal advice. Trademark, design and contract questions are jurisdiction-specific; consult a qualified attorney for your situation.
