PROFILE 1.800.973.1177

PAGE 1 continued on back

Deborah Hampton’s first and only job in-

terview out of Adelphi University’s Lawyer

Assistant program in 1982 was with a small

boutique intellectual property firm. She

knew nothing about intellectual property and

trademarks at the time. Now few paralegals

know more.

An active member of the International Trade-

mark Association, Ms. Hampton is respon-

sible for managing and maintaining Limited

Brand Inc.’s Victoria’s Secret trademarks.

Limited Brands’ other trademarks include

EXPRESS, Bath & Body Works, The Lim-

ited, The White Barn Candle Co., and Henri

Bendel.

Ms. Hampton’s job is to conduct global

searches and clearances for new trademarks

and to make sure companies are not infring-

ing on any of Limited Brands’ trademarks

or that Limited is not infringing on some

other company’s rights. She’s been with

Limited Brands for just six months, a job she

coincidentally got through the LawCrossing

job search engine. Ms. Hampton was recently

named one of the Top 15 Paralegals by para-

legal author Carole Bruno, who will feature

the paralegals and their secrets to success in

her upcoming book.

Ms. Hampton said a “trademark is a compa-

ny’s greatest asset” and she likes the idea

that some of the trademarks she helps create

and protect will be around for 100 years of

more. With Limited Brands, her shopping

takes on new meaning

“Shopping is definitely one of my passions,

and this is one of the times I actually get to

incorporate it into what I’m doing for work,”

she said. “You have to be aware of who your

competitors are and reviewing the trendy

magazines, the InStyles, the Vogues, etc., to

get a sense of what’s hot, what’s not.”

Although her job is relatively new, Ms. Hamp-

ton has worked in retail before. Early in her

career she worked for Jordache in 1984 and

1985. One of the first trademark’s she worked

on at Jordache was Diesel.

“It’s a very strong trademark,” said Ms.

Hampton. “I remember getting a rejection

from the trademark office saying that at the

time it was conflicting with another mark

and I remember drafting a response to the

trademark office arguing why it should be

registered and why it shouldn’t be confused

with another mark. And like I said, 20 years

later it’s still going strong. That’s incredibly

satisfying.”

Ms. Hampton said one of her greatest profes-

sion accomplishments was being the only

non-lawyer on a three-person team respon-

sible for naming her most recent employer,

Agere Systems Inc. She worked non-stop for

almost five months clearing the name around

the globe. She likens the experience to having

a child.

“It’s a rush,” she said. “It’s almost like having

a baby. You carry a baby for nine months and

then it’s out there, it’s on its own and it grows

up. You’ve got to let it go. It will succeed or

fail, and I think one of the milestones of my

career is always going to be Agere. Because

it’s a company name. If the company lasts for

100, 200 years. I had a hand in that.”

Ms. Hampton said to clear a trademark, she

works with trademark experts and attorneys

around the world. The more common the

name, the more difficult it will be to get it out

there as a business or product.

“The stronger the mark, the more unique,

the more different, the easier that process

is,” she said. “The more suggestive, the more

descriptive or common the mark is the more

difficult it’s going to be. And because Agere

didn’t mean anything and was very unique,

it was a very, very good name to name a

company.”

Ms. Hampton said she also gets a rush when

she sees a product in Victoria’s Secret or a

Limited store, where she gets ample dis-

counts and uses them.

Ms. Hampton, who has also worked in the

telecommunications sector for much of her

career including a stint at AT&T, said she

believes she has more responsibility in the

corporate world than she might have in a law

firm.

“In a corporation, the key is you get to know

your business, the product line and the indus-

try that you’re in and so you get very up close

and personal with it. You get to know the

business,” she said. “You have much more

client contact I think. Or you can have more

client contact than in a firm situation. You’re

working with the business people, you work

with the marketing people and you work with

Profile: Deborah Hampton, paralegal, Limited Brands, Inc. New York City [by Regan Morris]

Deborah Hampton treats trademarks like living, breathing things that she has helped create—and she’s proud of her cre-

ations. LawCrossing talks with the trademark paralegal about her career with Limited Brands Inc., a career that incorpo-

rates one of her favorite pastimes—shopping.

PROFILE 1.800.973.1177

PAGE 2

public relations.”

But you can never avoid your clients in a cor-

poration, because they work right down the

hall. The most important aspect of corporate

trademark work is “getting to know your

product inside and out.”

And Ms. Hampton prides herself on studying

all the trends in retail and about what prod-

ucts Limited Brand is selling.

For paralegals interested in trademark work,

Ms. Hampton said it’s most important to get

involved, find a mentor or two and get as

much education as you can. Start by joining

the International Trademark Association, she

said, and checking out for seminars on the

organization’s website. If your company or

firm won’t send you to the seminar, pay for it

yourself and go on vacation time, she said.

In 2004, she served as co-chair of the Inter-

national Trademark Association’s Trademark

Administrators conference. Ms. Hampton

said she was honored by the opportunity,

especially since she had been attending the

conferences since 1986 and was always awed

by the panelists and speakers.

“You have to be pro-active,” she said. “I think

there’s a tremendous amount that we can do

as non attorneys. I think we have to always

remember we’re not attorneys but I think

we’ve got a tremendous amount of things that

we can contribute. And we can have exciting-

-financially personally and professionally-re-

warding careers.”