Tuesday, December 1, 2015

On Trump's 'Central Park' Trademark

By Victor J. Ward

I love the concept of entrepreneurship. I subscribe to the Kiznerian school of thought; that is, entrepreneurship is about recognizing and acting on opportunity, not necessarily taking risks.

Take Trump's trademarking of the words "Central Park." Was it really taking risk for him to pay the filing fee in order to get the trademark? I say no.

Sure, he stuck the trademark on things that he may have already been producing, like furniture, but that's part of entrepreneurship: Seeing opportunities. He saw an opportunity to make his furniture more desirable by calling it the Central Park furniture line.

Trump also aligned himself with the trademark, making the Trump name even more valuable.

Any person could have done this if they had seen the opportunity. If someone had beaten Trump to the punch, either he would have paid them for the name or he would have licensed it from them

2 comments:

  1. Victor,
    All hail Israel (Kizner, that is haha).
    I get into the distinction all the time with Klein et al. They conflate the roles of entrepreneur and capitalist all the time and it makes me crazy. Almost as bad as the guy who has LESS apples, rather than FEWER.
    Any ENTREPRENEUR who has a cockamamie idea and then tries to shop it to a venture CAPITALIST knows the difference.

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