Scott Steinberg · Consultant, Analyst and Business Strategist
When a brand is the asset in dispute, the argument ofte moves from whether a mark was infringed to what the brand was worth, what happened to its equity, and whether the parties managed it the way the market expects. A consultant to 3000+ brands, Scott Steinberg testifies on branding, marketing, advertising, licensing and more.
Expert reports, declarations, deposition and trial testimony on branding, equity harm, rebranding and transition, brand architecture, naming practice and franchise standards, among other topics.
We cover myriad areas such as branding, marketing, advertising, registrability, confusion, infringement, etc.
Valuing a brand requires choosing and defending an approach: relief from royalty against comparable licensing, excess earnings attributable to the brand, or transaction comparables from the same category.
Testimony supplies the market inputs each approach needs and addresses which is appropriate given the asset, the category and the purpose of the valuation.
Where conduct is alleged to have damaged a brand, the analysis looks for movement in the measures that constitute equity: awareness, consideration, preference, price premium and retention.
Testimony connects the conduct to observed movement in those measures, and tests whether other factors in the period account for the change.
Forced or negotiated name changes raise questions about what transition actually costs: awareness rebuilding, signage and packaging, digital estate, search equity and customer confusion during the changeover.
Testimony addresses what a transition of that scale reasonably requires and over what period, which frequently bounds a damages figure or an injunction argument.
Disputes involve how brands relate within a portfolio: endorsed, house-of-brands or masterbrand structures, sub-brand autonomy, and what a parent's endorsement communicated to the market.
Testimony addresses architecture convention in the category and what a given structure would have signalled to buyers and partners.
Naming disputes involve development process, clearance practice, the reasoning behind a selection, and whether a name was chosen with awareness of the market position it would occupy.
Testimony describes how naming and identity programmes are ordinarily run and what diligence practice expects at each stage.
Extension disputes concern whether a brand plausibly reached into a category, what buyers would have accepted from it, and whether an extension diluted or strengthened the core proposition.
Testimony addresses category adjacency, permission to operate as the market understood it, and extension practice in comparable brands.
Franchisor and franchisee disputes involve brand standards enforcement, marketing fund administration, local versus national marketing rights, and consistency obligations across the system.
Testimony establishes what enforcement and fund administration practice looks like in comparable systems and how the conduct at issue compared.
Partnership disputes involve how brands appeared together, approval rights over joint presentation, exclusivity obligations, and what each party's participation contributed commercially.
Testimony addresses convention in co-branding arrangements of that type and what the parties would ordinarily have expected of each other.
Work may depend on tracking data, spend history and transaction comparables, which take time to assemble from multiple internal sources.
Written opinions on areas like brand management, equity movement, management practice and transition reasonableness.
Testimony on how brand assets are built, valued and damaged, grounded in the record rather than in theory.
Responsive analysis of valuation approach, comparable selection and equity attribution assumptions.
Non-testifying review of brand tracking data, spend history and licensing records, plus discovery scoping.
Scott Steinberg is an analyst, consultant and business trends expert with over 25 years of experience providing management and strategic consulting services to more than 3,000 businesses and brands ranging from startups to government agencies and Fortune 500 firms.
He has testified in sample areas including but not limited to intellectual property — copyrights, trademarks and patents — patent infringement, marketing, branding, video games, mobile applications, consumer product development, and the growth and monetization of online distribution platforms.
He is the author of over 30 books and has published more than five thousand articles addressing areas including but not limited to marketing, technology, leadership, innovation, advertising, digital transformation, data privacy and social networks. He appears regularly on ABC, CBS, CNN and NBC, and has led seminars and training programs for organizations including Wells Fargo, the PGA Tour, Century 21, Ford, Dell and Procter & Gamble.
His consulting work has been broadly recognized. He has served as a thought leader for the American Bar Association and Corporate Counsel magazine, and has received honors from the International Association for Scholastic Excellence, Fortune, and the 21st Century Icon Awards, among others.
A branding expert witness generally treats the brand as a commercial asset and addresses what it was worth, what happened to its equity, and whether the parties managed and transitioned it the way the market expects. It covers sample areas like valuation, equity harm, rebranding cost, architecture, franchise standards and partnership conduct.
Trademark testimony addresses legal questions about the mark: likelihood of confusion, strength for validity purposes, genericness and trade dress. Branding testimony addresses the asset: what the brand is worth, how equity moved, what a transition costs, and how brand systems are ordinarily managed. Matters involving both frequently run them in parallel.
Through a defensible method matched to the asset and purpose: relief from royalty benchmarked against comparable licences, earnings attributable to the brand above what an unbranded equivalent would produce, or comparable transactions in the same category. The inputs are market facts, and their comparability is usually where the argument sits.
Brand tracking data covering awareness, consideration, preference and price premium; retention and repeat purchase records; pricing and discount history; and search and enquiry volume. The analysis looks for movement coinciding with the conduct and tests whether other factors in the period explain it.
Yes. Consulting-only engagements cover case assessment, review of brand tracking, spend and licensing records, valuation approach assessment, deposition question preparation and critique of an opposing expert's method, without a disclosed report or testimony.
Initial conversations about scope, timing and conflicts are without charge. Helpful detail includes the brand and period at issue, the transaction or conduct involved and any expert disclosure deadline already set.
A conflicts check is run before any substantive discussion. An initial note listing the party names and a one-line description of the dispute is enough to start; please hold privileged or confidential material until the check clears.