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PARK CITY — Vail Resorts’ attempt to trademark “Park City” has raised questions for other local businesses that share the city’s name.
Vail operates Park City Mountain Resort, and executives maintain the move is simply to protect the ski resort’s brand.
“Our sole interest is ensuring that no other ski resort in the United States can use the Park City name and that no one can falsely represent that they are the Park City ski resort,” Kristin Williams, vice president of mountain community affairs for Vail Resorts, said in a statement issued to KSL Wednesday.
Still, some business owners said they were initially taken aback by the move, and remained uncertain about what the potential trademark meant for the future.
“I think for anybody who calls Park City home and identifies as a ‘Park-ite,’ the idea that someone would trademark our name seems a bit off to all of us,” said Canice Harte, owner of Park City Running Company.
Park City Film Series Executive Director Katharine Wang said her organization applied for a trademark under its name when it initially appeared Vail Resorts’ application was going to be broader in scope, and other local businesses did as well.
“Probably just like us — they want to make sure that they can continue to operate under the name that they have selected and spent a lot of time and energy branding themselves around and building a customer base around that name,” Wang said.
Williams noted in the statement from Vail Resorts that a number of businesses in the area own registrations for names that include “Park City” and there is “at least one other business” that owns a registration for only the words, “Park City.”
“We fully expect that our registration for ‘Park City’ in connection with the operation of a ski resort will not affect those businesses in any way,” Williams said in the statement. “We welcome comments and engagement by anyone who has concerns that our application could affect them and look forward to working through issues.”
Harte said he understood Vail’s interest in protecting its business.
He called for city involvement in the matter.
“The two bodies need to work together to make sure that the wide variety of small businesses in the community feel safe and protected and no one has to worry about what happens 5 or 10 years down the road,” Harte said.
Park City councilman Tim Henney said the council would discuss the issue during its work session June 9.
