Trademark question: How does "The" and "Company" enter into it?

Question

Lets say I trademark (made up phrase), "Albany Car Wash".

Am I protected if someone starts "The Albany Car Wash Company"?

Vice verse, if I trademark "The Albany Car Wash Company" and someone uses "Albany Car Wash" do I have grounds to pursue it?

Answer 1

The conflict check is based on the overall similarity -- and the number of unique words or terms in conflict.

"The" and "company" are generally ignored (for the most part) when performing conflict checks -- because the likelihood of confusion is very high with or without those generic words.

It all comes down to that likelihood of confusion standard.