Why T&M trusted Brands Seal is Important?
The practical importance of test seals, quality and certification signs is growing. Due to the growing number of products and services on offer, consumers are increasingly looking for trustworthy verification marks to help them decide for or against a product or service.
In this context, consumers not only pay attention to quality marks that relate to the quality of the goods or services, but criteria such as animal and environmental protection as well as sustainability are increasingly moving into the focus of consumer awareness.
Until now, many suppliers have sought protection for their seals and quality marks through individual or collective marks.
The certification mark enables independent trademark owners to award their quality seals or test marks to selected companies. With this, the trademark owner assumes the guarantee for certain characteristics of the goods and services of another supplier, such as the organic production of goods, fair production conditions or special safety standards.
The decisive difference between the certification mark and the traditional individual mark is the fact that the guarantee function, rather than the origin function, is in the foreground. This means that the public will not perceive the certification mark as indicating that the product or service bearing it specifically originated from a particular undertaking, but as indicating certain independently guaranteed characteristics of the product or service bearing it. This guarantee function gives rise to the main characteristics of the certification mark, namely transparency, neutrality and monitoring.
The principles of neutrality and transparency to which the certification mark is subject, combined with extensive verification and monitoring obligations for the trademark owner, increase the requirements as to the clarify of the seal and strengthens the legal certainty for consumers compared to the conventional seals and quality marks.