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FRASIER’S FRIDAY FACT

Volume LXXXI

11/23/2018

Happy Friday!

Welcome back to Frasier's Friday Fact, where we cherish knowledge and continually build our mental database of useless information to use at parties. I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and are still fighting off the food coma.

Today is Black Friday, and some of you might be spending your day today inside malls. Often, inside malls, there are escalators.

Did you know that originally, "escalator" was a specific, trademarked product made by the Otis Elevator Company? However, over time, the name evolved to mean any set of "revolving stairs," much like Kleenex has become synonymous with tissues, Band-Aid with bandage, Thermos with insulated fluid receptacle, et cetera.

The difference, however, is that Otis lost the trademark to escalator in 1950. The Assistant Commissioner of Patents ruled that Otis "used the term as a generic descriptive term" in their advertising matter, and that the public recognized "escalator" as "the name for a moving stairway and not the source thereof." So any company can market an escalator, and not "revolving stairs."

In response to this case, see if you can notice advertisements specifically distinguishing their product from a generic term - Kleenex is clear to call their products Kleenex tissues, it's specifically "Band-Aid brand" in Johnson&Johnson advertisements, and look how Lego uses "Lego bricks."

Bonus Fact- the longest escalators in the Western Hemisphere are in the Wheaton Station of the Washington DC Metro!

Stay elevated, my friends.

Fraish