Crayola trademarks the ‘smell of its crayons –

You may find yourself smelling crayons in the aisles of stores soon — if Crayola’s chief executive Pete Ruggiero has his way. In July, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued a trademark to the arts and crafts giant for the smell of its crayons — that waxy scent of a childhood spent trying to color within the lines. While it’s too soon for this back-to-school season, Ruggiero imagines one day pumping it through the aisles of retailers, triggering nostalgia while shoppers are browsing and hopefully buying more crayons. Crayola, a unit of Hallmark, first applied for the trademark in 2018 and was initially turned down less than a year later, but won its bid on appeal. During the process, the company shared examples of its own crayons as well as competitors to verify the distinctiveness. It’s a “slightly earthy soap with pungent, leather-like clay undertones,” according to the trademark documents.”We’ve been talking about doing it for years,” Ruggiero said about the trademark. “That Crayola smell, there’s a connection between the smell and childhood memories that is very powerful.”

via /. & the Financial Post. Here is the trademark (PDF).

Neato – “Sensory” Trademarks / Service Marks including motion, sounds, odors, and colors can be the subject matter for US Applications for Registration in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. From I understand, Some countries, China is one example, do not permit scents to be trademarked. Play-Doh is also trademarked. I am not aware of any electronics that have trademarked a scent yet, but there an open-source certification for “Buddy List” a genderless fragrance “inspired by waiting for your crush to log on to instant messenger.” So one could trademark the name, but release the open-source “recipe” just like many open-source hardware companies do for their hardware – looks like “World Wide Web” was the first certified open source hardware perfume (a genderless fragrance inspired by Internet infrastructure).

There are Play-Doh scented candles on Etsy, HOWEVER – it looks like Crayola is making sure there are not any called Crayola crayon scented candles, perhaps this was part of the reason for Hallmark (Crayola) getting the trademark this year.

A little update, I emailed a friend about this and they said “So the smell of crayola crayons hasn’t changed since 1905? Color me skeptical.”