July 11, 2002
Trademarks and Licensing: Don’t mess with the marks
You might think of Michael Reagan as a protector of dogs and Ws. On the other hand, you might think of him as the indirect protector of laborers thousands of miles away from his office at the Visitors Information Center.
As the University’s director of Trademarks and Licensing, it’s Reagan’s job to make sure that the University’s official marks — the Husky dog and the big W, for example — are used correctly and tastefully. But in the case of Husky products, he has a bigger responsibility. The University has promised that none of the sweatshirts, T-shirts, mugs or other items with official UW marks on them will be produced with sweatshop labor. To avoid that, Reagan wants University staff to contact him before they order products.
In fact, contact with Reagan should be the first step in any planned use of a University mark. Adding the University seal to a poster? Contact Reagan. Including a “UW” in your PowerPoint presentation? Contact Reagan. Ordering some Husky dog mugs for your graduating class? Contact Reagan.
“People think this will be complicated and sometimes they see it as intrusive,” Reagan says. “But we’ve really set it up to work easily. Most requests can be handled in minutes.”
If, for example, a department wants to add the University seal to its recruitment poster, all they have to do is e-mail Reagan, telling him what the poster is. He will not only give them permission, but will supply the seal electronically.
It’s a little more complicated when a department wants to order Husky products. What some University staffers may not understand is that not only are all the University’s marks federally registered trademarks, but they’ve gone through a branding process as well. This means everything about them has been standardized. Particular shades of purple and gold must be used, the dog must always be pointing in the same direction and so forth. Anything that doesn’t meet the standards is illegal and should be returned to the manufacturer.
“When people come to me wanting permission to have Husky products made, I send them to people who have been licensed by the University to produce such products,” Reagan says. “That way, we know the marks will be produced correctly, and that the products won’t be made in sweatshop conditions.”
He knows that because beginning a few years ago all UW licensees have been required to join the Fair Labor Association and to sign a code of conduct agreement. They have to tell the University who their manufacturers are, no matter where they are in the world, and the FLA and another organization called the Workers Rights Consortium check up on these manufacturers to see that they’re abiding by the code of conduct.
Working through Reagan for Husky products has another advantage: it’s often the cheapest way to go. Given the high volume that UW licensees produce, Reagan says, their price is usually the best.
Given all this, why don’t people work through Reagan’s office? Part of it is a change in rules raising the dollar amount a department can spend without going through Purchasing. In the past, he explains, Purchasing alerted campus buyers that they should work through Trademarks and Licensing on Husky products. But when departments set out on their own to make such purchases, they may not be aware of the need to do that.
Also, there are salesmen working the campus area who are known as specialty products people. “They’ll sell you any product you need, from key rings to T-shirts,” Reagan explains. “They’ll put whatever you want to put on it.”
Reagan knows all the specialty products people and isn’t interested in putting them out of business. But they are not licensed by the University, which means that if a department chooses to work through them, the department risks having University marks reproduced incorrectly or, more important, having those products produced in sweatshop conditions.
“If a department really wants to work through a specialty products person and contacts me, I can arrange for a limited-use agreement,” Reagan says. “But this means that the specialty products person has to take responsibility for where the products are manufactured, and that’s difficult for them to do. Often, they don’t even have that information.”
One other issue campus people should be aware of regarding Husky products is that if they are selling them, then royalties are due. University licensees include royalties in the price they quote to such customers, but this may not be true of other manufacturers.
Campus people ordering Husky products have to fill out a simple form and submit their designs to Reagan’s office, but he emphasizes that the process is simple and not time consuming.
“We’re not doing this to make people’s lives difficult,” Reagan says. “We’re doing it because it’s such an important thing to the University and to the students to not have Husky merchandise made in sweatshop conditions.”
