Since we were looking at the Canadian market for our invention there were some decisions that needed to be made. Our original filings of Trademarks in the U.S. were done on November 1st 2010. You have 6 months to file in other countries and still be able to claim priority. Claiming priority means that if your trademarks are granted in these other countries, you can claim the date of first filing which in our case is the November date. If you wait longer than 6 months you take the chance that someone will claim your trademark or if they started using the trademark before you filed in the other country they would be safe.
We decided to file in Canada and I went to the Canadian Intellectual Property website. They had an entire list of trademark attorneys. I sent emails to about 10 and got prices back ranging from $1250 to $2300 for each trademark. After more research I found a sample filing and decided to follow that format to file myself. The cost of filing yourseld is $250 canadian for each. So we saved at least $4000 because we filed 4 trademarks. The form seems relatively simple to fill out as long as you follow the sample provided. We'll see if I did everything correctly. If not, they will contact us and let us know what questions they have or what needs corrected.
If you decide to file for Trademark protection in other countries it might pay to look at their websites and see if it's something you can do yourself. You might be able to save some serious money.
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