A portable toilet manufacturer who has been trying to brand his outhouses “Here’s Johnny” has — like his clients — nowhere to go.
A Michigan-based company has first tried marketing “Here’s Johnny Portable Toilets” in 1976 — but Carson, then the host of “The Tonight Show,” stopped it in court claiming he had a trademark on the famous phrase.
When Carson died in 2005, the trademark ended — and the potty maker, Earl Braxton, tried again to put “Here’s Johnny” on the market.
Last week, a little-known administrative court inside the US government’s Patents and Trademark Office. ruled that Carson had rights to the signature phrase even after death — and that the potty people were flush out of luck, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
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