secondary meaning
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 305 U.S. 111 - Kellogg Co. v. National Biscuit Co. · 1938Most cited · 1,659 citing opinions
To establish a trade name in the term 'shredded wheat' the plaintiff must show more than a subordinate meaning which applies to it. It must show that the primary significance of the term in the minds of the consuming public is not the product but the producer.
How the Supreme Court has restated “secondary meaning”
Each Supreme Court definition of “secondary meaning,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “secondary meaning”
Court decisions citing the 3 opinions that defined “secondary meaning” — 3,210 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 3 definitions, chronological · 1934–1938
- ORIGINAL
This will happen, for illustration, when by common acceptation the description, once misused, has acquired a secondary meaning as firmly anchored as the first one.
The right arises not from the trade-mark acts but from the fact that 'Nu-Enamel' has come to indicate that the goods in connection with which it is used are the goods manufactured by the respondent. When a name is endowed with this quality, it becomes a mark, entitled to protection.