Fross Zelnick Lehrman & Zissu, P.C.

Allison Strickland Ricketts helps clients build and protect their trademark, so that they can use it as a sword and a shield as they go forth in the world.

She is a prosecution specialist, of course. In her nearly three decades of practice, she’s reviewed and evaluated thousands of trademark clearance searches, and has filed and prosecuted more than 2,500 U.S. trademark applications, including critical work on emerging technologies for WeWork and integrating a new league into Major League Soccer’s existing IP structure. There are few practitioners in the country who have managed the same quantity and quality of work with similar skill and success.

But for all its veracity, the “prosecution specialist” tag doesn’t do her practice justice. 

Her expertise is a crucial component in high-stakes trademark disputes. The strength of her prosecution work protects clients from litigation, both in disputes and negotiations—and her work has turned disputes decisively in her client’s favor. Litigators rely on her intuitive understanding of the weakness of an adversary’s claims to gain courtroom advantage. 

She uses her accumulated prosecution experience to help clients explore uncharted applications of trademark law. Most recently, she helped clients from a variety of sectors, including a casual clothing giant, explore the possibilities—and limitations—of non-fungible tokens and other digital rights vehicles.

Her influence and reputation in the marketplace is unsurpassed. She’s a trusted resource for officials in the Patent and Trademark Office, sharing advice and insight that make her discipline straightforward and efficacious—for instance, spearheading a petition program at the USPTO that made refiling trademarks tied to obsolete technology simpler and conflict-resistant.