Hi! I am glad I have found you! I am just a small startup with no revenue. I tried to register a trademark and now being bullied by a company that I cannot financially outdo. I have been sent a letter by them. My site is “XXX” and the company that owns “X” has an issue with us trying to register “XXX.” But not only that, now they are asking for us to give up the domain name, remove the word everywhere, etc. and I need to respond to this letter
We registered our domain name based on what our site’s purpose is. Posting things (and services) that people are looking for, essentially nothing is actually for sale on the site, just things people are looking for. So our business model is completely different, but I get that they think we are trying to capitalize off their name, but we are not. In fact their reputation is poor, and a good reason to distance ourselves from them. We have not even had a single transaction since we launched in Nov 2020, a year ago. I don’t have a problem with changing our name to something else. But some of their demands, such as saying we will not renew that domain name, is a point of contention because someone else will just register it. So I would want to know if they would purchase it from me. Second, I would like to know if they would compensate the costs to me for the trademark and fee from trademark machine. I don’t know if they would! But as a compromise, I think it would be fair. But I also know they probably figure they have the upper hand in all areas like financially, they can afford a court hearing, etc. I just feel they’re bullying with no actual proof that my name has caused any confusion at all.