With the Super Bowl coming up, it is important for brands looking to capitalize on football-themed promotions to remember that the terms “Super Bowl” and “Super Sunday” are registered trademarks guarded by the National Football League (NFL) more closely than a shutdown corner on a wide receiver. Because there is a fine line between permissible fair uses of Super Bowl and Super Sunday (e.g., in on-air banter and news and sports reports) and impermissible promotional uses that may infringe the NFL’s trademark, here are some guidelines to keep you from going “offsides.”
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Discussion Questions:
- What is a brand?
- Is the NFL a brand? Is the Super Bowl a brand?
- How do companies protect their brands?
- Why is it important for companies to protect their brands?
- What is a trademark?
- Why do you think the NFL owns trademarks for phrases like “Super Bowl” and the “Big Game”?
- What is sponsorship?
- How might a sponsorship with the NFL allow a company to use protected phrases like Super Bowl in their marketing?
- What is ambush marketing?
- How might a company create a promotion around the Super Bowl without being an official sponsor?
- According to information from this story, what are some things a company would need to avoid from a marketing perspective if they were not an official NFL sponsor?