Mina Tanabe
Trademark and copyright attorney
A one-lawyer office, so the person who reads your name is the person who files it.
My parents ran a dry cleaner in Fountain Valley, and I grew up knowing what a name painted on a window is worth to a family. That is still how I think about a client’s mark: as the thing the business stands on.
I studied art history before law, which is why I read a logo and a label with the same care I give a clause. At a Newport Beach firm I filed trademarks for brands I would never have heard of. At an outdoor-gear company in Costa Mesa I was the only lawyer, and learned to answer a question in the time it took the truck to load.
Outside the office I draw badly, hike with a camera, and keep a drawer of old business cards from every client who has let me.
Facts, for anyone checking
The same record, laid out as a card you can take to your own lawyer or accountant.
- Bar admissions
- California2016
- Courts and offices
- U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, trademark mattersU.S. District Court, Central District of California2017
- Education
- J.D., University of California, Irvine School of Law2016B.A., Art History, University of California, San Diego
- Languages
- EnglishJapaneseconversational
- Memberships
- Orange County Bar AssociationIntellectual Property Law Section, State Bar of California
How a job runs
You write, I read
Send a few lines through the form or by email: the name, what you sell, where. I reply within a working day, and if it is a fit we set up a call of about half an hour.
You get a number before I start
Every job is quoted as a flat fee in writing, with the government’s fees listed apart. If it turns out to need more than we planned, I stop and ask before I spend your money.
You get copies of everything
Each filing, each letter from the office and each of my replies goes to you the day it moves. When the work is done, you leave with a folder you could hand to another lawyer.