A March 2026 decision from the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board offers a clear illustration of how the descriptiveness bar works in practice, and how an applicant's own marketing can become the most damaging evidence against registration.
The Applications
Spotlight Oral Care Limited, an Irish oral care brand founded by dentists, filed five Madrid Protocol extension applications in the United States for a series of word-and-design marks. Each mark combined the phrase MADE BY DENTISTS with a different illustrated creature, things like a cartoon shark, a feline, a primate, and a monster. The goods covered toothpaste, whitening strips, mouthwash, toothbrushes, and related dental products.
The USPTO's examining attorney required the applicant to disclaim the phrase MADE BY DENTISTS in each application, on the grounds that it was merely descriptive of the goods under Section 2(e)(1) of the Lanham Act. Spotlight appealed, and the TTAB consolidated the five cases and heard them together.
The Disclaimer Requirement
Before getting to the substance, it helps to understand what a disclaimer actually does. When a mark contains both registrable and unregistrable elements, the USPTO can require the applicant to disclaim the unregistrable portion. A disclaimer is a statement in the application record that the applicant is not claiming exclusive rights to that component standing alone. The composite mark can still be registered; the applicant just cannot later assert trademark rights in the disclaimed words by themselves.
Failure to comply with a disclaimer requirement is itself a basis for refusal. So Spotlight's choice to appeal rather than disclaim put the registrability of MADE BY DENTISTS squarely before the Board.
The Descriptiveness Analysis
A term is merely descriptive if it immediately conveys knowledge of a quality, feature, function, or characteristic of the goods or services. It does not have to describe the physical composition of the product. Under settled case law, a term that describes the provider of goods is also descriptive of those goods when the nature of the provider conveys something meaningful about the product itself.
The Board looked to an earlier case, In re Major League Umpires, for the controlling principle. There, the TTAB found the mark MAJOR LEAGUE UMPIRE merely descriptive for protective sports gear because the applicant's own advertising touted that the gear had been designed by a major league umpire. The professional identity of the designer was itself a characteristic of the goods. The Board later refined this in In re Recreational Equipment, Inc., clarifying that the rule is not that every reference to a source is automatically descriptive, but that when the source is a class of professionals whose expertise is relevant to the goods, the mark crosses into descriptive territory.
Applied to MADE BY DENTISTS for dental products, the conclusion followed directly. Consumers encountering oral care products marketed as made by dentists would immediately understand that dentists, professionals with dental expertise, were responsible for the design and formulation of those products. That is a characteristic of the goods. As the Board put it, the same reasoning that applies to a diet plan described as a "doctor's diet" applies equally to dental goods described as made by dentists.
The Dictionary Argument Did Not Help
Spotlight argued that the word "made" specifically means physically manufactured or constructed, and that dentists do not literally stand at a factory line assembling toothbrushes. On a narrow reading of the dictionary, the argument had some surface appeal.
The Board rejected it. Under trademark law, a term is descriptive if any one of its reasonable meanings is descriptive. The word "made" also carries the broader meaning of "caused to exist, brought about, created," and that broader meaning fits the dental goods context precisely. In the same sense that Henry Ford "made" the Model T without personally welding each chassis, the dentist founders of Spotlight "made" the oral care products by designing them, specifying the formulas, and directing how the goods came together.
Applicant's Own Website Sealed It
One of the more instructive aspects of the decision is how thoroughly Spotlight's own promotional materials undercut its legal argument. The Board cited Spotlight's website, which described the company as "Made by dentists for bespoke individual oral care needs" and included a banner reading "We Are Made By Dentists" with a quote from the founders about designing products that achieve professional results at home. Retail listings on Amazon, Walmart, Target, and UberEats described the products as "created by dentists" in nearly identical language.
This is a recurring theme in trademark prosecution. When a company uses a phrase in its ordinary descriptive sense throughout its advertising, it becomes difficult to argue before the USPTO or the TTAB that the same phrase functions as a source identifier rather than a product description. The Board cited the principle that an applicant's own marketing materials can be the most damaging evidence against registration.
The Third-Party Registration Argument
Spotlight submitted approximately two hundred USPTO registrations and allowed applications containing the phrase "MADE BY" without disclaimers, including marks like MADE BY TWO HAIRY GUYS, MADE BY MAMAS, MADE BY VETS, and MADE BY FIREMEN FOR FIREMEN. The argument was that the USPTO had consistently allowed similar constructions, which indicated consumers do not perceive "MADE BY" as descriptive.
The Board largely dismissed this evidence. Most of the cited marks involved fanciful or non-professional references, things like ghosts, chickpeas, bees, or unnamed individuals. Those marks do not identify a class of professionals with recognized expertise in the relevant goods, so the Major League Umpires standard simply does not apply to them. The handful of exceptions, like MADE BY FIREMEN FOR FIREMEN, either contained their own disclaimers or had prosecution histories that did not shed light on the examiner's reasoning.
More broadly, the Board reiterated that prior decisions by other examining attorneys have minimal evidentiary value. Consistency in examination is a goal, not a rule of substantive trademark law, and each mark is assessed on its own record.
The Outcome
The Board affirmed the disclaimer requirement. MADE BY DENTISTS must be disclaimed in each of the five applications. Spotlight was given 30 days from the decision date to submit the disclaimers, after which the applications can proceed to registration on the strength of the design elements.
The practical takeaway is that the composite marks are still registrable. Spotlight can register the MADE BY DENTISTS plus creature designs, and those registrations will cover the marks as shown. What Spotlight cannot do is later assert exclusive rights in the phrase MADE BY DENTISTS standing alone, and competitors in the dental space remain free to use that phrase to describe their own products.
What This Means for Brand Selection
This case is a useful reference point for anyone building a brand in a professional-services-adjacent product category. A phrase that highlights the professional credentials of the people behind a product, whether dentists, doctors, veterinarians, engineers, or any other licensed or recognized class, is likely to face scrutiny as descriptive when used on goods directly related to that profession.
The fix is not necessarily to abandon the concept entirely. Spotlight's marks were not refused outright. The creature designs and the stylized presentation of the full mark remain protectable. A disclaimer of the descriptive component is workable. But it does mean that exclusivity over the phrase itself is off the table, and competitors can use the same language freely.
If your brand name or tagline relies on a professional credential to convey quality, it is worth thinking through the descriptiveness question before you invest in building brand equity around a phrase you may not be able to own.
Questions about trademark clearance or registration? Book a free consultation with Five Dogs Law.
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