Case ID: ccpa_40-2/html/0908-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "O’Connell, Judge,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

203 F. (2d) 767; 97 USPQ 333
    In re The Diamond Fertilizer Co.
    (No. 5949)
    
      United States Court of Customs and Patent Appeals,
    April 15, 1953
    
      Slough, and Slough (•/. Helen Slough of counsel) for appellant.
    
      E. L. Reynolds for the Commissioner of Patents.
    [Oral argument March 9, 1953, by Mr.. Reynolds; submitted on brief by appellant]
    Before Gaeeett, Chief Judge, and O’Connell, Johnson, Wobley, and Cole, Associate Judges
   O’Connell, Judge,

delivered the opinion of the court:

This is an appeal from the decision of the Commissioner of Patents affirming the decision of the Examiner of Trade-Marks denying appellant’s application for registration on the Principal Register under the Act of 1946 of the mark “EZ FLO” for use on insecticides (dusts), plant and horticultural parasiticides, agricultural, crop and animal sprays, fungicides, and plant hormones for agricultural use.

The sole'rejection advanced by the examiner and approved by the commissioner is that the mark as a whole is descriptive within the purview of section 2 (e) of the character or quality of the goods with which it is used, because the letters “EZ” together with the misspelled word “FLO,” are merely the phonetic equivalent of the words “Easy Flow.” 91 USPQ 343.

The Solicitor for the Patent Office in support of the decision appealed from properly urges that the involved dust is one which is sprayed; that the passage of dust through a spraying device, either in a solution of liquid or entrained in a gas, such as air, would ordinarily be described as a flow; and that the only reasonable impression which could be derived from the words “Easy Flow” when applied to material designed to be sprayed, is that such material would flow easily, uniformly, and without clogging the spraying device.

Appellant’s contention that the words which constitute its • mark are not descriptive but merely suggestive of the desirable character or quality of the goods with which the mark is used cannot therefore be sustained.

For the reasons stated, the decision of the Commissioner of Patents is affirmed. 
      
       Citing, Ex parte Jeffrey Mfg. Co., 60 USPQ 382; Bar parte Welch, 64 USPQ 310.
     
      
       Citing, Webster’s New International Dictionary, Second Edition; Bechwith v. Commr. of Patents, 252 U. S. 538; Andrew J. McPartland, Inc. v. Montgomery Ward & Co., Inc., 35 C. C. P. A. (Patents) 802, 164 F. (2d) 603, 76 USPQ 97, certiorari denied, 333 U. S. 875; In re Swan & Finch Co., 49 D. C. 95, 259 Fed. 991. See also Celanese Corporation of America v. E. I. DuPont de Nemours & Co., 33 C. C. P. A. (Patents) 948, 154 F. (2d) 146, 69 USPQ 101.