“I asked about one name, and Mina found the two others I had not thought to check. We changed it before the first order, which cost me a weekend instead of a pallet of labels.”
Jovan R.Skin-care founder
Trademark and copyright lawyer in Irvine
Check the name before you print it
A one-lawyer practice for founders and makers in Orange County and beyond. I search the register, file the application and answer the examiner myself, with every fee quoted in writing first.
Candid.
I say so when a name is unlikely to register, before you pay to file it.Early.
A search before the first order ships, not a letter after the knock-off.Itemized.
Each fee in writing, and the government’s listed apart from mine.
Filing fees are set by the Trademark Office and the Copyright Office, and change from time to time.
Mina Tanabe
Trademark and copyright attorney
Most people reach me with a name they love and a launch date. I would rather see both before the signs go up.
I came to this work through a loading dock. After law school I filed trademarks at a Newport Beach firm, then became the only lawyer at an outdoor-gear company in Costa Mesa, where a label problem could hold a truck at the door. I learned what a name costs when it turns out to belong to someone else, and what an afternoon of searching would have saved.
Now I do that work for smaller companies: app and game studios, skin-care and food brands, surf and skate labels, musicians with a merch table. You deal with me, not an associate. I answer my own email, put each fee in writing before the work starts, and tell you when something is not worth filing.
I take
- Trademark searches and applications
- Copyright registration
- Licenses and contractor papers
- Examiner’s letters and oppositions
On the record
Where I am admitted, where I file, and how I trained.
Bar admissions
California
2016
Courts and offices
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, trademark matters
U.S. District Court, Central District of California
2017
Education
J.D., University of California, Irvine School of Law
2016
B.A., Art History, University of California, San Diego
Languages
English
Japanese
conversational
Memberships
Orange County Bar Association
Intellectual Property Law Section, State Bar of California
Three kinds of work
Claim, share, keep
Owning a name or a work has stages, and each has its own page with what it includes and what it costs.
Before you launchClaim
Search the name, file the application, register the first works, and get the ownership papers signed while everyone still agrees.
Claiming a nameA search and a written read of the risks
The application, filed in the right classes
Copyright registration for a first work
When others want inShare
Licenses, collaborations and the papers a freelancer or a distributor signs, settled before the first invoice.
Sharing your workLicenses for art, music, software and names
Contractor and co-founder assignments
Distribution and wholesale terms
After it is yoursKeep
Deadlines, renewals, a watch for lookalike filings, and a measured letter when someone copies you.
Keeping what is yoursA calendar for every mark you hold
Takedown reports and demand letters
Oppositions when a letter is not enough
Heard after the filing
“The quote listed every fee, the government’s included, with the total at the bottom. The other two I had gotten did not say what was extra.”
Henrik L.Game studio founder
“When a seller copied our deck design she wrote one letter and told me what she would do if it did not work. It worked, and I understood every step.”
Sione T.Skate label owner
Each client’s matter is different. These comments describe one person’s experience and do not promise a similar result.
Tell me the name, or the problem
Two or three lines are plenty. I read every message myself and reply with what I would do first.