WASHINGTON — Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble has filed applications with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria, Virginia, for trademarks for three-letter acronyms, including LOL and WTF.
Publicly available application documents show the original applications were filed in April.
While it is unclear whether any company can trademark acronyms of any kind, let alone widely used ones that are popular in social media and email and text communications, the trademark applications appear to be working their way through the PTO review process.
PTO has sent Procter & Gamble a “non-final office action,” meaning either that it’s requesting more information or making an initial refusal.
The trademark applications for the acronyms indicates they would be used for marketing “nonmedicated liquid soap, dishwashing detergents, hard surface cleaners and air fresheners.”
While Procter & Gamble has not commented publicly on the trademark applications, it may be trying to use millennial-friendly lingo to boost sales of its products to the largest consumer group.
Procter & Gamble’s hundreds of consumer brands include everything from Bounty paper towels and Charmin toilet paper to Crest toothpaste, Dawn dish soap and Downy fabric softener.
The Cincinnati-based company had more than $65 billion in global revenue last year.
