What Does a $995 Trademark Filing Include?

The $995 figure you see advertised is the flat attorney fee for a Full Filing covering one mark in its first class. Each additional class in the same application is $695. Neither figure includes the separate USPTO filing fee, and it is worth knowing exactly where the line between the two sits before you sign anything.

Two fees, not one

Every trademark application has two separate costs, and reputable providers should always show them separately. The first is the attorney fee, what you pay a lawyer to evaluate the mark, draft the application, and manage the filing. The second is the USPTO filing fee, a government fee paid directly to the United States Patent and Trademark Office to file and examine the application.

At The Branding Iron, the attorney fee for a Full Filing starts at $995 for one mark in its first class, plus $695 for each additional class in the same application. The current USPTO base application fee is $350 per class (as of July 2026), paid on top of the attorney fee. So a single mark filed in a single class runs from $1,345 all-in: $995 to the firm plus $350 to the USPTO. The government fee is paid to the federal government, is generally nonrefundable once the application is filed, and is not something any attorney or filing service controls or discounts.

This distinction matters because advertised prices across the industry are usually the attorney fee alone. If a number seems unusually low, ask whether it includes the USPTO fee or only the service fee, the two are always separate, no matter who you file with.

What the $995 Full Filing covers

The Full Filing is meant to take a proposed mark from initial review through a filed application, with direct attorney involvement at each step. In a typical engagement, that includes:

• Intake and strategy review
• Attorney-directed clearance search
• Written risk assessment
• Ownership and filing-basis review
• Goods-and-services drafting
• Specimen review for use-based applications
• Application preparation and filing
• Routine status monitoring and reporting
• One response to the first non-final Office Action, whether procedural or substantive
• Ordinary intent-to-use attorney work through registration for the originally engaged mark/classes, including the appropriate use filing and up to five permitted extension requests; USPTO fees are additional

The last two items on that list are worth calling out on their own, since they carry real value and are easy for a competing provider to leave vague.

The first non-final Office Action response is included

This is a meaningful part of the package. If the USPTO issues a first non-final Office Action, the included response is not limited to correcting a typo or accepting an examiner’s wording. It covers one complete response to that first Office Action, whether the examiner raises procedural requirements, a likelihood-of-confusion refusal, descriptiveness, a specimen issue, or several issues together. The response includes the legal argument and reasonable evidence development appropriate to that initial submission. A later or final Office Action, appeal, consent agreement, unusually extensive evidence project, or work beyond the first response is separately quoted.

When I examined applications at the USPTO, the quality of the first response often shaped the rest of the record. That is why I would rather define and include the first substantive response up front than advertise a low filing price and treat the first real legal issue as an automatic surprise charge.

Intent-to-use work is included through registration

If the application is filed based on a bona fide intent to use the mark, the $995 attorney fee also includes ordinary ITU prosecution for the originally engaged mark and classes. That means preparing the appropriate Amendment to Allege Use or Statement of Use, reviewing the proposed specimen and use dates, and filing up to the five six-month extension requests permitted after a Notice of Allowance when the launch is not ready. You pay the USPTO fee for each filing, but no additional attorney fee for that ordinary work. Petitions, requests to divide, changes to the mark or owner, substantial corrective evidence projects, refusals arising from a use filing, appeals, and contested matters are separately quoted.

USPTO fees apply to each use or extension filing.

What is quoted separately

A flat fee only works if both sides are clear about its edges. Items that fall outside a Full Filing and are quoted separately include:

None of this is unusual in trademark practice. Substantive legal work beyond the original scope, an appeal, an opposition, a second refusal, is a different task with different time and risk, and it should carry its own written quote rather than be silently absorbed into the original fee.

If you need more than one class

Trademark classes group goods and services into categories, and some businesses legitimately need more than one to cover everything they sell. Attorney fees scale by class, though not in a straight multiple: two classes ordinarily carry a $1,690 attorney fee, the $995 first class plus $695 for the second, and three classes $2,385. USPTO fees are $350 per class on top ($700 for two classes), unless a written quote states otherwise. This is one of the more common places first-time filers underestimate cost, since it is easy to assume “one filing” means “one fee” regardless of how many classes are needed.

How the search credit works

A standalone search starts at $395. If you retain the firm for a Full Filing on a mark and class covered by the assessment within 30 days of delivery, $395 is credited toward that filing's attorney fee. The total credited across all filings will not exceed the assessment fee you paid. So for a single mark you do not pay $395 plus the full $995; you pay the remaining $600 filing attorney fee, plus the applicable USPTO fee.

Why a flat fee, and why the first class costs more

A flat fee is meant to make cost predictable before work begins. The reason the first class carries a higher fee than each class added after it is that a good deal of the work is done once for the mark rather than once per class: clearing the mark, confirming ownership and the filing basis, and settling the overall filing strategy. Each additional class then adds its own goods-and-services drafting and its own examination exposure, which is real work but a smaller increment. Examination itself happens class by class, which is why classes are priced separately at all. A flat fee quoted in writing, before any work starts, is the standard this firm holds itself to on every engagement.

What to confirm before signing

Before any Full Filing engagement begins, you should receive a written scope that spells out, in plain language, exactly what is included for the $995 attorney fee, what the separate USPTO fee will be for your number of classes, and what would trigger an additional quote (a later or final Office Action, an appeal, extra classes). If any of that is unclear or only described verbally, ask for it in writing before you sign, a flat fee only protects you if its boundaries are written down.

The price should be the easy part of the decision. The harder questions are whether the name is worth pursuing, who should own the application, what the filing actually needs to cover, and how much later-stage work is included. A short fit call will not answer the clearance question, but it will establish the right next step and the exact written scope before you commit.

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This article is general information, not legal advice, and results cannot be guaranteed; pricing is subject to the written engagement agreement. Last reviewed July 2026. Sources: USPTO, USPTO fee schedule (current application fees); USPTO, Apply to register a trademark (intent-to-use extension timing); USPTO, Trademarks Dashboard (current processing times).