JPC Registers Trade Mark

The Intellectual Property Office (IPO), formerly The Patents Office, has published details on its website of the Joint Parish Council's application for Trade Mark protection of its new logo. To view the full details of this application.

Trade Marks are usually registered to protect different brands of products, such as soap. There are around 8,350 parish councils and a search of the Trade Mark register did not find another parish council which had registered a trademark.

This seal was originally used by the Guild of Holy Trinity & St John, which later became part of the Court Leet. Henley adapted it at a later date. When this example of the seal was made in the 15th century, it had the inscription on it which states that it was the borough (or burgesses) of Henley. Any document sent out by the town would contain a wax seal. Unfortunately, the seal matrix for making the imprint has not survived.

There is now a period of 2 months for the IPO to receive observations from members of the public. Any observations should be sent to: UK Intellectual Property Office, Trade Marks Registry, Tribunal Section, Cardiff Road, Newport NP10 8QQ, quoting reference: Trade Mark 2522951.

One of our readers has told Henley NEWS On-line that the new logo resembles a Pontefract cake, shown left. Pontefract cakes (also known as Pomfret cakes and Pomfrey cakes) are a type of small, roughly circular black sweet measuring approximately 2 cm in diameter and 4 mm thick, made of liquorice, originally manufactured in the Yorkshire town of Pontefract, England.

The original name for these small tablets of liquorice is a "Pomfret" cake, after the old Norman name for Pontefract. However,that name has fallen into disuse and they are now almost invariably labelled "Pontefract cakes". Originally, the sweets were embossed by hand with a stamp, to form their traditional look, but now they are usually machinery formed. The embossed stamp was originally a stylised image of Pontefract Castle.

The old logo, shown right, was copied from the Beaudesert and Henley Society's logo without the copyright owner's permission and for that reason could not be trade marked. At a recent council meeting, the parish councillors having decided that they wanted a trade marked logo, considered two new designs. One the Guild of St John seal and the other the crest, which is used for the town's boundary signs and the Town's website. 

The parish councillors voted by a majority for Guild of St John seal (left) to replace the familiar yellow and blue logo above.

The new logo has already appeared on the parish council's stationery. The cost of this rebranding exercise will be paid for out of the JPC's communications budget, which was significantly increased this year.