When you are involved in trademark infringement litigation and need a consumer survey expert to bolster your case, Keegan & Donato Consulting can quickly deliver the intelligence you need within a wide range of budgets.
Keegan & Donato Consulting, a specialty research consultancy, is located in Rye, New York. Principals Mark Keegan and Tony Donato have a combined 25-plus years of industry experience and provide expert research, analysis, affidavits, and reports on behalf of plaintiffs and defendants in support of trademark infringement litigation.
We provide a complete suite of services, including consulting on litigation strategy for clients across the nation, consumer research studies, expert reports, testimony during litigation, testimony at deposition and/or trial, and rebuttal of opposing parties’ surveys when applicable.
How a Flawed Survey Can Damage a Case
Consumer surveys can play an important role in proving likelihood of confusion, secondary meaning, strength of mark, acquired distinctiveness, consumer perception and other issues, when other scientific evidence is simply not available.
Surveys are highly vulnerable to criticism, however, and courts are careful to scrutinize them for methodological flaws. Issues of sample selection, interviewer bias, or suggestive wording may cause a judge to give a survey little weight, or deem some or all of the results inadmissible.
In Water Pik, Inc. v. Med-Systems, Inc., 726 F.3d 1142, 1144-50 (10th Cir. 2013), for example, there is a lengthy discussion wherein the Court concluded that the defendant’s survey evidence “had too many methodological flaws to be of any probative value.”
And in Elliott v. Google, Inc., 45 F. Supp. 3d 1156 – Dist. Court, D. Arizona (2014), the plaintiff’s surveys were deemed inadmissible because the Court determined them to be unscientific and poorly constructed. The survey expert was also rejected as unqualified “to design a survey or to interpret survey results” [see 45 F.Supp.3d 1167-1170].
Are Trademark Surveys Expensive?
Keegan & Donato Consulting designs custom trademark surveys to meet the needs of each individual case. This can involve targeting specialized populations of respondents and developing unique designs to address the specific issues of importance in the case. These factors will affect the time and level of difficulty of executing a consumer study and its overall cost.
Most of our consumer surveys cost from $30,000 to $80,000 to complete, and $55,000 is the most typical cost. We work on a fixed rate or hourly basis depending on your needs and will work with you to design a survey that is both reliable and within your budget. We will always provide you with an estimate of project costs prior to engagement.
Expert Witness Testimony
If you need an expert when the facts and issues of your case are not easily understood or when a court would benefit from empirical evidence related to relevant issues in the case, Mr. Keegan and Mr. Donato have testimony experience as expert witnesses in a number of high-profile cases involving trademark infringement and consumer behavior.
Get in touch with the survey experts at Keegan & Donato Consulting at (914) 967-9421 to learn more about the importance of consumer survey evidence in trademark infringement litigation. We will help you design a reliable, methodologically sound consumer study to support your case.