What is logo design?
A mark designed to be registrable — and delivered with the files a trademark filing actually needs.
No US federal agency touches logo design. It is a private creative-services market that runs from AI generators like Looka, priced per download rather than per project, up through contest platforms like 99designs and full agency engagements running into the thousands of dollars — and every tier produces the same thing legally: artwork, not a registered right. Finishing a logo doesn't register anything with the USPTO or the Copyright Office. What a business actually owns once the artwork is done depends on a decision it makes afterward — whether to leave the mark protected only by automatic copyright, file it as a federal trademark, or, if the mark's physical shape matters on a product, pursue a design patent. Those are three different legal instruments with three different agencies, three different eligibility tests, and — for two of the three — a mandatory US-licensed representative if the client is filing from outside the United States. A business that treats "we had a logo made" and "our logo is protected" as the same sentence is the client this service exists to catch before that gap becomes expensive.
The design work itself runs the same brief-to-delivery pipeline regardless of market: a discovery brief covering brand values, audience, and every place the mark will actually appear — packaging, a storefront sign, an app icon, embroidery — because each use case constrains what the mark can look like, followed by concept directions, structured revision rounds against written feedback, and final delivery of the locked direction with its colour and typography variants. The step that separates a usable outcome from a folder of PNGs is the same one that matters for whatever comes next: vector master files (AI, EPS, SVG) that scale from a favicon to a billboard without redrawing, raster exports at the sizes the brief specified, and — where the client wants one — a short brand guideline covering clear space, minimum size, colour values, and which variant to use where.
Who does what
| Your CapEasy team | Logo design, the reconciliations and reporting behind it, and the questions list that keeps it honest. |
| Your CPA or enrolled agent | Everything that carries a licence in United States — rendered exactly as written: issue compilation, review or audit reports — those are restricted to licensed cpa firms. |
| You | One conversation with one named person, and the decisions that are genuinely yours. |
Logo design in United States
A logo gets no registration of its own — copyright, trademark, and design patent are three separate, optional filings with three different agencies
Finishing a logo design registers nothing anywhere. Copyright protection attaches automatically the moment an original work of authorship is fixed in a tangible form — no filing required — and it protects the artwork itself from being copied. It does nothing to stop a competitor from using a confusingly similar mark to sell related goods or services; that protection only exists once the mark is registered as a federal trademark with the USPTO, a separate step the client chooses to take. And if what actually matters is the mark's ornamental shape as applied to a physical product, that's a third instrument entirely — a design patent — with its own novelty examination. We build the mark and hand off a filing-ready file for whichever path the client picks; which filings to pursue, and when, is the client's call, made with the relevant licensed professional.
Foreign-domiciled applicants cannot file a US trademark or design patent application without a US-licensed representative — copyright is the one exception
Since August 3, 2019, every foreign-domiciled trademark applicant must be represented by a US-licensed attorney under 37 CFR §2.11(a); since a rule effective July 20, 2026, the same requirement extends to design patents, where a foreign-domiciled applicant needs a USPTO-registered patent attorney or agent under 37 CFR Part 11. Neither of those gates applies to copyright registration — the US Copyright Office does not require a US attorney for a foreign applicant, which makes copyright the one IP filing in this category that can move directly from design to registration without a mandatory attorney handoff. That split is why this leaf's handoff always includes a copyright-ready file: it's the one protection step available without waiting on a third-party professional.
Work made for hire almost never applies to a commissioned logo — a written assignment is what actually transfers ownership
Under the Copyright Act, the person who draws the artwork owns it unless the work qualifies as "made for hire." That doctrine automatically vests ownership in the hiring party only for a genuine employee's work within the scope of employment, or for an independent contractor's work if it fits one of nine narrow statutory categories and both sides signed a written work-for-hire agreement before work began. A standalone logo commission almost never fits those categories, so a written assignment — a separate document, not a work-for-hire clause buried in an invoice — is what actually moves ownership to the client. A business that commissioned a logo from a freelancer without one may not hold clean copyright in its own mark, which surfaces as a real problem the day it wants to license the logo, sell the business, or enforce it against a copycat.
A trademark or design patent search checks a different question than "is this artwork original"
A logo can be drawn entirely from scratch, with no copying involved, and still infringe an existing federal trademark if it's visually or conceptually similar to a mark already registered for related goods or services in USPTO's Trademark Search database. Originality and trademark clearance are separate questions, and passing the first tells a client nothing about the second. We run a preliminary check against USPTO's Trademark Search database and a domain/business-name scan on the finalist concept before delivery, so a conflict is caught while it still just means picking a different direction — a full clearance search ahead of an actual filing is deeper work that sits with the trademark leaf, but the basic check happens as part of design.
What your CPA or enrolled agent receives from us
- Vector master files in AI, EPS, and SVG — the format a US trademark attorney needs to prepare a specimen, a patent attorney or agent needs for formal design-patent drawings, and the format that scales without redrawing.
- Raster exports (PNG and JPG) at the sizes the brief specified for actual use — web, print, signage, social profile.
- Logo variant set: horizontal, stacked, and icon-only versions, plus single-colour and reversed (on-dark) versions where the brief called for them.
- A written copyright assignment from whoever drew the mark — in-house designer or subcontracted designer — transferring ownership to the client, filed alongside the delivery, since a work-for-hire clause alone almost never covers a commissioned logo under US law.
- A short brand guideline noting clear space, minimum size, approved colour values (hex/CMYK/Pantone as specified), and which variant to use where — for packages that included one.
- A preliminary clearance-check summary from USPTO's Trademark Search database and a domain/business-name scan run against the finalised concept, so the client knows the state of the field before using or filing the mark.
