Stuff Interior Designers Need To Know: Insider Industry Advice for Residential Interior Designers
Looking for real-talk wisdom that'll help you steer your residential interior design biz to sweet, sweet success?
Welcome to "Stuff Interior Designers Need To Know" – the podcast where seasoned interior-designer-turned-marketing-and-communication-strategist Rebecca West of Seriously Happy Coaching & Consulting serves up perfect pours of business and industry advice for residential interior designers who want to help their clients get seriously happy at home.
No topic's off-limits and the advice is wide-ranging, covering everything from how to create an interior design website to what interior designers need to know about bookkeeping. No matter the topic, every episode is meant to help both new and experienced residential interior designers succeed in business.
So put down that paint fan and let’s dive in for some no-nonsense, totally actionable advice that'll help your design biz thrive and keep your sanity intact.
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Hosted by business coach Rebecca West, an interior designer with nearly two decades of experience running her residential interior design firm Seriously Happy Homes. She’s obsessed with costume parties, cat videos, and - oh yah - raising the standards for professional interior design services.
Stuff Interior Designers Need To Know: Insider Industry Advice for Residential Interior Designers
Ep 7: Don't Give Away The Rights To Your Name! and Other Essential Legal Advice About Licensing, Trademarks, & Copywrite from Lawyer Nicole Dolgon
Want to Be the Next Joanna Gaines or Nate Berkus? Here's What You Need to Know About Licensing Your Name
Ever wondered what it takes to build a brand like Joanna Gaines, Nate Berkus, or Jonathan Adler—the kind that turns your name into a household one (and a revenue stream)? You’re not alone!
In this episode of Stuff Interior Designers Need to Know, we’re diving into the world of licensing, trademarks, copyrights, and patents with Nicole Dolgon, an attorney at ESCA Legal in New York. If you’ve ever dreamed of expanding your brand beyond client projects—whether through product lines, media deals, or collaborations—this is a conversation you need to hear.
Nicole breaks down:
✅ When to start thinking about trademarks and legal protections in your business
✅ How to avoid signing away the rights to your own name (yes, it happens!)
✅ The legal must-knows for designers who want to scale their brand
Whether you're just starting out or already eyeing brand partnerships, this episode will give you the legal foundation to protect your future empire.
🎧 Tune in now! 😀
Want to contact Nicole Dolgan?
www.esca.legal
Instagram: @nicoledolgonesq
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Have you ever been curious about what it would take to become the next Joanna Gaines or Nate Berkus or Jonathan Adler, Ellen degenerates. These people who have clearly licensed their names and leveraged their brands to create income beyond a lot of our wildest imaginations. Well, I was curious about that too. So today we're talking with a lawyer who helps specifically with licensing and trademarks and copyrights and patents to figure out what we need to know if this is something that we want to pursue as part of our careers. Welcome to stuff. Interior designers need to know the podcast where the title says it all. If you're a residential interior designer and interior design business owner, this is the place to find out the stuff you need to know to succeed in business in the short and longterm. And create a business that makes you seriously happy. Today we're talking to Nicole. Dolgan one of the lawyers at ESCA legal in New York. Our job today is to dive into what it actually means to think about licensing and trademarks and copyright as an interior designer. So that we know how early we should start thinking about the things we need to put in place in order to make those dreams a reality. Nicole's got advice on everything from how early you should start talking to a lawyer in your business to maybe even more importantly, how not to sign the rights to your own name away so you can't even use it any longer. Without any further ado, let's dive in to this conversation.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Hi, Nicole. Welcome to the show today.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Thank you for having me.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:I have been looking forward to this conversation because I find the intricacies of where our careers can go when they're at these advanced levels really interesting. So we're obviously here to talk about law, legal stuff, licensing, trademarks, and copyrights. Before we dive in very briefly, tell us what law firm you're from. And where you're based.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Sure. So hi, I'm Nicole Dolgan. I'm a partner at Escalegal, which operates in Manhattan, though our clients are all over. And I am our commercial contracts partner. So I lead our commercial practice at our law firm.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:And for those of you who don't know, one really great way to catch my attention would be to, I don't know, drop Ellen's name. I used to be obsessed. I'm obsessed with her and the E. D. brand and just her obsession with home. When we first connected, you had said that you used to work with Ellen on her legal team. So that caught my attention. But you've also worked with a lot of other interior design brands. This is your world,
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Yeah, absolutely. So I began my career at a small law firm in the city doing a lot of litigation. And it wasn't exactly where I wanted to go with my career. And flash forward to make a long story short. I ended up at Ed Elena generous, which is Ellen's lifestyle brand. And at the time the company was really in its infancy, trying to figure out how to build out a lifestyle brand for a celebrity, which at the time was not as known as it is now. You know, you obviously had Martha Stewart who did her thing at Kmart. But we built out through a licensing model, which you and I will talk about. Ellen's name in all of these great categories, most of which were in the home category based upon her love of home and design. So the categories ranged from furniture to lighting, bedding, bath. And then we had apparel, we had footwear, we had accessories, we had pets, we had babies, really, really ran the gamut. But the home and design categories were, I think probably her greatest. Loves. She has impeccable taste. She's a prolific home flipper in California. And so, Everything was really rooted in that love of home. And that's what really kind of piqued my interest in home and design as it relates to interior designers, as it relates to making sure that they're protected from an intellectual property. And also like, I'm just a great consumer of all things home. Like I love shopping. I love vintage. I love auction. You know, I'd say half of the people that I follow on Instagram are designers as I'm like, salivating over these beautiful images. So I was with her for four and a half years and that was actually where I learned a lot about home. We went to high point, we had partners that were in the U S and North Carolina that we worked closely with. My role In house there was obviously the legal aspect of it, but we were a lean team. So I was also involved in product development and design and seeing things through. So I got a great education from the legal perspective, but also understanding from beginning to end how you get something from concept to reality. And I think that a great lawyer. Has to know those things as well.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:And I mean, just having that passion makes it fun to work with your clients
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Oh my gosh. So fun. Like I would love getting line sheets and reviewing them with like our experienced designers and being like, I would get that. I would get that. And I did get obviously a bunch of fabulous stuff that I have in my home. But that was such a cool aspect of it.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:So I find that the intersection between celebrity and interior design is a really interesting one that has really changed in the last few decades. And so some of our listeners are going to be the designers, the one with all of the actual experience, knowledge and talent. Other people might be. Design enthusiast, because like Ellen wasn't a designer, but she was a design enthusiast and obviously had done a lot of flipping. So I want to get our heads around two things today. One is the difference between copywriting and trademarking and licensing. I'm sure there's a lot of fuzzy knowledge around this.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Yep.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:I'd like to give people a sense of when they should be thinking about this and like, like where would their career be going in terms of when might they need to think about these things. And then the follow on to that is how soon should they be consulting with experts in that journey. So let's start with the definitions licensing trademark copyright go. Okay.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Yep. So, at a very fundamental level, a trademark is a legally protected word, phrase, logo, design, and it enables you to distinguish your goods and services from others. from somebody else in the market. So why is that important for interior designers? I can think of four reasons. The first brand recognition. So clients can easily associate you and identify you and know that that is your brand exclusivity, which is particularly important for designers because often their company and their namesake is based off of their actual name. You know, you and I talked about Jonathan Adler yesterday. I would bet that he probably has a trademark on his name. So it gives you the exclusive rights to use your brand, your name, your Logan, your slogan, and you don't have to worry about anybody else using it because that exclusively belongs to you.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Want to make a quick clarification. As I understand it, that will be within certain categories. So, there is the possibility that you could have, I don't know, Jonathan Adler, motor oil, because he hadn't protected his name in a certain category. Is
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:that is correct. So when you. File a trademark application, you aren't filing it for every use of the word that could ever exist in the entire world for perpetuity. The trademark office is looking at whether you are using it in certain classes and categories or whether you intend to use it. So, you know, you're, you're ruminating through what your business model is going to be in your strategy. I intend to use my trademark in X, Y, Z categories. The standard is. Is this going to create consumer confusion? So give the example of Jonathan Adler. I'm sure he has his trademarks in textiles, in furniture, in retail online services. You know, I'm, I'm saying all of these without having personally fact checked, but I would imagine as an attorney, that's what he has. Jonathan Adler motor oil. Yeah, that's certainly a stretch, but again, the standard is consumer confusion. Would the typical consumer look at that and say, Huh, I wonder if Jonathan Adler has extended his name to motor oil. Like is he a, a legacy where his family is involved in that and we just don't know about it. So you have to prove to the trademark office and advocate and persuade and provide solid arguments and evidence that either you know, if you're looking at it from an infringing perspective, yeah, this creates consumer confusion. We have an issue or they're so distinctly far apart that the typical customer would look at that and say, Oh, I know that they're totally separate beings. I don't need to worry about that. Does that make sense?
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Absolutely. And one more point of clarification. Everything we're talking about when it comes to trademarks, copyrights, and licensing, it is country dependent, right? So this is only going to cover your rights in the United States.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Yep. So what I'm talking about now is couched in the pretext of the United States and the United States as it applies to international, we do foreign filings at my law firm because the vast majority of our clients are not just filing in the United States. They are filing you know, in the Middle East, or they're filing in Europe. You're utilizing mechanisms that enable them to file broadly in certain countries. As we talk in this conversation, I'm speaking as if this is the United States, but we do a lot of foreign filings. We have a big foreign filing practice.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:And I'm not surprised to hear that because the interior design industry is so global. That I would think that you get into global law quite a bit more often than people might expect.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:And a big area of what we do is counterfeit and enforcement, which is a huge part of intellectual property, which we'll talk about. So we're filing proactively in places like China. And we're litigating often with sellers on, you know, Amazon or Alibaba or Timu or whatever based in China that are manufacturing and knocking off our clients very easily and, and very cost effectively. So we're encouraging our clients to file with that strategically in mind.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:It feels like it must be a game of whack a mole, like you, you've put out one fire and there's gonna be another one. have the strategies around that changed because it has become so easy to do copyright infringement?
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:We implement a broad and comprehensive strategy to enable us to identify who the big players are. Also, with the pretext of, you know, we have to keep budget in mind as well. So these. Enforcement litigation programs can become costly. Let's see if we can identify who the major players are in the major infringers and be strategic about it. You know, I think that we have this idea in our head that these counterfeiters are infringers are these kind of, you know, random Joe Schmo people. These are sophisticated factories. These are sophisticated business people who have bought product reverse engineered it and figured out how they could do it cheaper. Um, and in many instances, they are just directly knocking off product. Using the, you know, we have clients who are well known. And using their images without approval, without permission. As if they are, you know, endorsing it and it's really pervasive and it can be like whack a mole, but if you have a really good strategy in place and a strong legal team, and you're dealing with it in a proactive offensive manner versus a defensive manner, then it should not be something that keeps you up at night.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Okay, excellent. All right, so obviously we went down a bit of a rabbit hole there. So that was trademark. Now what about copyright and licensing?
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Sure. So copyright is a legal right that pertains specifically to original works of authorship. So you think of something in a tangible format that you can copyright, a drawing, a sketch, a design, something creatively tangible. Right arises automatically as a result of that. So copyright has many of the same benefits as trademark does, but it attaches to a tangible format. So it's valuable for protection and enforcement like you and I just talked about ownership and enabling exclusive rights, preventing unauthorized usage and copyright like trademark adds to your. Arsenal of intellectual property that permits you to do something like licensing, which you and I will talk about and create almost a passive revenue stream for designers to collect royalties and percentage. And in some time, in some instances, guarantee revenue as well. So trademark and copyright kind of inform the toolbox of a designer to be able to go out and license product because you cannot license without intellectual property in place in the form of. A trademark or a copyright.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Got it. So, if we have the idea that we might want to license our names in order to do brand collaborations, Then we actually should be thinking earlier about trademarks and copyright. Like, what are you coming to the table and selling? What is your name worth?
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:Exactly. And you do that for a number of reasons. One, you physically cannot license without having your intellectual property in place because you are representing and warranting to the person that you are licensing to that I am the owner of the copyright. There's no other third party in the universe that's going to make a stake over these goods. I own them and I am licensing them to you. So it kind of offsets risk and liability for the person that you're licensing to, for them to say, I am the only one that's getting these licensed rights, so I don't need to worry about, you know, this person popping out of the woodwork and suing me because I know that I have the rights directly from the rights holder.
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Okay. Got it. So we still need to Talk about what licensing is, but I'd like to also frame that within an example in terms of the benefits to the company that's licensing and the benefits to the person who is being licensed. So tell us about licensing.
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:sure. So a licensing agreement is a legal agreement where the intellectual property owner, let's say an interior designer who has trademarks and copyrights, licenses and gives permission to another party to use their trademark and copyright under specific terms and conditions that are in a license agreement. And that is for payment or royalties. So a licensing agreement is really mutually beneficial to both parties. So for the licensor, IE, the license, the intellectual property owner, as we said, it's a way for them to monetize their designs. They're going to be getting a royalty that's based off of sales. In some instances it's guaranteed revenue because the licensee, the one who's, who's. Getting the intellectual property and the right to use it in some instances have to guarantee royalties to them. So it's kind of a way of getting in some ways, passive income to a designer
rebecca_1_01-15-2025_183359:Passive income after a lot of heavy lifting to
nicole-dolgon_1_01-15-2025_123359:after a lot of heavy lifting and, you know, a certain degree of credibility. Like, If you're a random individual, why are you valuable to need a license? If you're somebody that's built up your name, like you and I, again, we're talking about Jonathan Adler and all these great collaborations he does, he brings a great deal of credibility to the table. So I want to be able to work off of that because the name, similar to Ellen, the name brings prestige. It already brings in a whole customer base that they've had for a long time. So. They are wonderful candidates for a licensing relationship. And so another benefit to a designer who's licensing their IP is that you're partnering with somebody ideally who has all the manufacturing capabilities, all the distributional reach, and you don't have to hold the inventory.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:Okay, so licensing is definitely a benefit to both parties and if somebody thinks they want to someday Take advantage of this as a designer. They are the kind of designer who should be thinking about building up a huge newsletter list, building up a huge following on social, that that is really what the licensure is buying even maybe more so than good design. Is that fair to say?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:They're looking for credibility, consumer recognition, and solid intellectual property. And I think those three pillars will inform a partner whether this is something to move forward with or something to stay away from. So I think you hit the nail on the head.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:So let's talk about how. Early, somebody should be talking to a professional, a lawyer like yourself. How soon should that be happening? When we're talking about trademarking, licensing, any of these kinds of things.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:I say at a very high holistic level, you speak with an attorney at every growth phase of your business. Specifically as it relates to intellectual property. I advise that you begin thinking about that and putting a strategy in place in tandem with formation of your business. So as you're getting your corporate formation documents in place and what you're figuring out how to identify your entity, you should simultaneously be thinking about what can I protect that would make me feel safe? Identifiable that would allow me to exploit my brand in an exclusive manner and set me up for success. So that if I need to enforce my rights down the road, I have in place my solid toolbox of intellectual property that I can enforce upon. So in the very beginning, you should be consulting with an attorney and maybe you file For one thing in one category in one class, you know, it doesn't have to be a huge comprehensive intellectual property portfolio from the get go, because quite frankly, not everybody has the budget for that. And that's just the reality. If you're starting up your business and your startup. You have a budget that's probably line item by line item you're paying attention to, but legal must be one of those line items. So you speak with an intellectual property attorney at the very beginning to identify what, as part of my brand, do I want to be recognizable? What do I want to be able to enforce in the future? And what do I want to be able to monetize on? So maybe that's your name. Maybe it's a specific logo. Maybe it's a design. It depends obviously on the designer. But from the very beginning, I would advise you speak with an attorney.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:And I'm curious, how does it, how do I want to ask this question? I'm thinking about fashion design, right? So you'll have some like Kate Spade and she's got her bags and some skirts and stuff. Does her name then automatically cover anything that she has designed? Or do you have to individually cover each product and each design that you're creating?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:So it's interesting that you bring up Kate Spade as an example, because this is an instance in which. It would have been incredibly advisable for her to protect her name and not assign away her rights to her name, which is what ended up happening. So Kate Spade the designer, the eponymous fashion designer, assigned nearly all of the rights to her name as a trademark to the Kate Spade Company, which was then sold to Liz Claiborne. So Kate Spade legally changed her name to Kate Valentine. So that she could promote her new accessories line, Francis Valentine. So the designer behind Francis Valentine was Kate Spade, but she could not use her name because she had assigned away her intellectual property rights and her trademark to her name, which prohibited her from using it. We saw this with Jessica Simpson. Jessica Simpson has a huge lifestyle brand. As you may know she has fashion, she has accessories, she has shoes. I think she has jewelry. And so I don't exactly remember like the procedural history, but what ended up happening was she sold away. And her rights to use the name Jessica Simpson were given to another company. So she couldn't use. Her own name and monetize on that.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:now. She's to clarify. She can still be that name, but she can't
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:still be, but if she wants to sell fashion under Jessica Simpson, she wouldn't be able to do it.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:Wow.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:So she had to buy back at a premium. The rights to use her own name. It also happened with Bobby Brown, the makeup artist who now has a new company called Jones Road Beauty and Bobby Brown, the makeup brand still exists separately. So This is exactly why it is so advisable for a designer from the get go to make sure that they have their intellectual property in place. And if they are planning to expand or sell or exit, that they are very careful with assigning away the rights to the trademark for their very own name. Because once you sell it, You can only get it back by buying it back and that's your own name and you have a lot of passion and pride and reputation and hard work with your own name, it's an unfortunate situation where individuals assigned away the rights to their own name and can't monetize on their own name anymore.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:That is absolutely fascinating. And it brings up a question I have. It must be four or five years ago now, I was seeing all these things on the internet about how easy it is to apply for a trademark. Just like all things business, there's so many snake oil salesmen out there saying, Oh, it's so easy to do something, which I did fall for. And so I do hold some trademarks on some things, but I did not go in with a strategy. I didn't go in with a strategy about what category I was applying to because I didn't know to ask these questions.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Sure.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:So it's, it's really important for our listeners to understand like You don't know what you don't know. Just like if somebody is doing their first kitchen remodel, they don't have a clue what they need to decide in what order and when, and you end up spending a lot of money and have gotten absolutely nowhere.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Listen, you have the right idea, so you can't fault yourself 100%. Like it was incredibly wise and probably way more advanced than other people to even think in the first place. Oh, I should set up a trademark like kudos to you. I think that that is awesome. What we advise our clients is. Do a search, think strategically about where you see yourself one year from now, five years from now, 10 years from now, let that inform your decision.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:So when somebody is applying for a trademark, what should somebody be asking to make sure they end up in the place they intended to end up?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:So when you're applying for a trademark, it is wise and advisable to do something called a knockout search before you actually go forward with applying because you wouldn't want to just kind of apply Millie Willie and then the trademark office refuses your application or objects to it. And then you're back to the drawing board. So before going through the time and effort and money associated with a trademark application, it is advisable to go through a knockout search beforehand to make sure that nobody else already has rights to that name or that brand or that logo or slogan or whatever it may be. It's perhaps easier if the trademark that you are looking to apply for is your own name. You know, it's, it's, it's not as easy when you have, I don't know, a paper company and you want to call it. You know, I think that's more identifiable. That would not cause consumer confusion that's not already registered. A knockout search will show all of that. And so we, our firm does that. All the time where we have a client come to us and say, I'm really interested in expanding into this category. Can you do a knockout search of this can you please let me know any of the results? So I know if I can put my company's time and energy into this actual product, or if I'm just wasting my time because it already exists. And once you have a trademark in place, you expand upon it. It is easy to file a trademark application. What's not easy is making sure you're doing your due diligence on the front end to make sure that you're not going to have an issue down the line, which I think is. From what I understand, maybe the part that you skipped.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:Yeah, I would say so. So going back to being strategic and thinking about the partnerships you would want to pursue, let's say that there is a designer who's like, Their dream would be to follow in Jonathan Adler and Iris Apfel's name and have their name on a ruggable rug, just to take something at random. Do you recommend to your clients that they think about brand alignment and making sure that you're already targeting the same kinds of clients and being strategic at that level?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:It depends on your goals. So for example, if you want to go into a category that you have no experience or background with, but you want to enter that market and align yourself with a partner that has capabilities in that market, then that makes a lot of sense. You know, what we also counsel our clients on is you also want to do your due diligence on the partner. You want to make sure that your brand ethos aligns. And so, you know, something that makes sense from a consumer perspective, from a business perspective, those parts of the conversation are just as important. All of these things inform the decision before it is made.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:Because I'm imagining that like the folks at Ruggable, which is definitely more of a mid market product, would be looking for a different notoriety than the folks at a at a different luxury brand. I'm thinking specifically about how you posted recently about the brand collaboration between Kravit and Pottery Barn.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Yep.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:And I'm assuming that there was a lot of conversation about the alignment between those two brands.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Yep.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:And you guys represented Kravit. Did Kravit just come to you and say, Hey, we're super psyched about, being in a relationship with Pottery Barn or where do these conversations even start?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:I think, you know, both parties on either side see an alignment. Kravit has this fabulous design archive. Pottery Barn has distribution, retail locations, vibrant e commerce, fabulous PR and marketing and newsletter campaigns. So it's a natural synergy. And you know, when you said, To perhaps different brands. I think a lot of the target collaborations target and Missoni, for example, where you have target, you know, mass market more of an attainable retailer and you have something like Missoni, which plays in a really high end space. Those collaborations fly off the shelves. So sometimes it's very, it's very much mutually beneficial because maybe Missoni wants to be a little bit more mass, but wants to do it in a strategic temporary way. And that's a great money grab for target to align with a Missoni for all these people that can get these fabulous Missoni designs that they're known for at an attainable price. So. The goal is very much a business informed decision where parties want to align and legal is very much at the table for those conversations because Most of the time you think of a Kravitz, you think of Missoni, those are legacy brands, you know, Kravitz is a family multi generational brand. So is Missoni. And so there's a lot of protectiveness over the designs and their archive and what they bring to the table. They're not going to just align with anybody, but the retailer sees so much value in that because even though they're, you know, multi generational family brands, their household names in so many ways. And so there's so much appeal for them as well.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:Right, elevating both brands and increasing distribution of both that already well known name and, in this case, the Pottery Barn products.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Exactly.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:Mm hmm. So, now going to the question that I always want to ask, what is it you wish people really understood? about licensing and trademarks and copyrights, specifically in this case, what do you see them mostly get wrong?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:What a great question. I'll answer the first question first. Everything that we do, it comes informed from a business approach. So what I would like people to take away from this conversation is the value of legal seat at the table early and often. Engage a trusted legal advisor. That you align with from a mission perspective that you align with from a cost perspective and who can help you inform strategies so that you're not making decisions that can cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars down the road. And we see that with counterfeit, we see that with infringement. We see that as we just talked about designers losing the rights to their own name. So engage legal early and often. To kind of. Dive into the second half of your question. One of the mistakes that we see is people not doing that. So at the end of the day, they haven't developed their IP. We represent a lot of family brands where The newer generation sees the value of intellectual property and the older one doesn't quite understand why legal is such a big number on the line item budget. And it's up to the younger generation to explain to them the importance of having legal at the table In a proactive offensive way versus, you know, you're online and you see that your stuff has been knocked off and it's being sold for pennies on the dollar. That feels terrible because designers take so much pride, obviously, in what they do. And it's a really, it pulls up their heartstrings when someone takes that. It's something that they've worked so hard on and just rips it off for nothing. And so to kind of, to, to wrap that sentiment up, engage legal, find someone that you identify with that understands you, understands your mission and work closely with them, work closely with them to set you up for success. Work closely with them when you're analyzing new decisions and business opportunities, Consult with them because they will save you time. money, headache, energy down the road.
Speaking of advisors that you should be consulting with, that'll save you time and money and headaches. Let's talk about the various advisors and their relationships to each other. You've got your CPAs. You've got your attorneys. You've got bookkeepers. How much in your experience, should those people interact with each other? And I asked this because as a newer business owner, I felt very confused about who to ask what, and when.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Sure. I advise my clients establish your brain trust early and make sure they work together holistically and well. So you should have on hand. A lawyer that you, that you respect and that you want to be part of your team, a business advisor, a tax partner, you know, even marketing is a really big part of this conversation, PR and marketing. So you should establish your brain trust that works together. Because otherwise it feels like a series of siloed conversations. And for somebody who is starting their business and probably already overwhelmed by the undertaking, having your professionals and advisors shouldn't be adding to your headache. So establish your brain trust that works together, introduce them, have lunch with all of them together so that if you have, you know, a legal question, you know, to ask your attorney if the, the attorney has a question about a tax implication for something, they just go straight to your accountant and they can ask that question. So it should, it should be a brain trust.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:and I think that this gets missed by a lot of interior designers because so many of us are solopreneurs and it's really easy to start an interior design business without much capital outflow. If you're not opening a showroom or manufacturing. And so you can sort of sidestep some of the business steps that a business that needs to get funding together from the get go can't sidestep. And so I think that a lot of interior designers end up waiting a really long time before they have the courage to put those advisors in place because they feel so expensive in the early days.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:sure. And I understand that Absolutely. You know, you're a startup, you have a lean budget, you want to make sure you're allocating resources efficiently and appropriately.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:I think the point that we want to share is that if you wait too long, it will end up costing you more than it would have cost if you're a bit more strategic and take that risk earlier.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Exactly right. Exactly right. So from the get go, build it into your budget, a line item for legal speak with a variety of attorneys I'm always available to assist but have an understanding of what the budget should be and what you're really physically able to do at that point. And maybe you devote a little bit of your budget now to legal and then the next fiscal year you allocate a little bit more. But have it be part of your process from the beginning.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:So a couple of extra questions here. One would be how important is it to choose a lawyer that is in the state in which your business is registered?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Not necessarily important at all. We are a New York law firm, but we have clients who are in California. We have clients who are in Miami. So we represent clients. all over. I would say, I would say 50 percent are on the East coast and 50 percent are on the West coast.
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:And then the follow up question, is I understand that you guys are, an intellectual property law firm. Is that fair to sum
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Yes, absolutely. So we represent brands that have an intellectual property focus and that value their intellectual property. We are a full service law firm. So we have an intellectual property practice that will build and manage your property. We have a litigation practice. We have an enforcement practice where, you know, we are actively looking at strategy and figuring out whether a takedown is appropriate. A cease and desist moving forward with litigation. We have the commercial practice, which I run. We have a patent practice where a lot of our clients were coming to us wanting to patent their products. And so we brought that in house. so
rebecca_2_01-15-2025_190011:quick side side journey there? So a patent is yet another thing you can apply for. And I'm assuming that that covers. Inventions and gadgets?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Yes, so a patent is a type of intellectual property that is given to an inventor. For an invention or a business. And it gives the patent holder, the one who owns and has created the patent, the exclusive right to use it for a certain period of time. Typically it's about 20 years from the filing date, so it covers a long period of time. And there are different types of patents depending on what the good is. So there's design patents. that protect the design or the aesthetic aspects of a functional item. There's utility aspects that cover the actual kind of mechanism for adjustable furniture. Think of a lazy boy chair, for example, it reclines. There are plant patents that go for landscaping and gardening. So there's all of these kinds of different types of patents, depending upon what the actual good is.
Excellent. Thank you so much for that clear explanation. So obviously this whole conversation sort of jumps ahead of where a lot of people are going to be listening in on this conversation today, we're talking about patents and copyrights and trademarks and all of these intellectual property things. But when somebody is newer and a business, when they're starting their business, I assume that the first thing they should be talking to a lawyer about is their contract and the things that are going to protect them from liability when it comes to designs that they're creating and the implementation of those designs.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Yeah, so we are full service in every aspect of those words. So I would be working closely with our intellectual property partner, Francesca, who would be managing the portfolio, advising on what trademarks and copyrights, working closely with me. And as I said, establishing your brain trust is so important. So when I'm working on an agreement for my client and their IP portfolio is in house with us, I can quickly take a look and see what do they own, what do they register for, have they received any office actions, which are you know, correspondence that comes in from the trademark office requesting more information. So I already have a very clear state of the union, and I don't need to go back to my client and waste their time and money asking them to gather information from other sources. So we do all of that in house.
And just like I asked earlier about what you wish, we all knew about licensing and trademarks and stuff. What is it? You wish that we knew about liability and setting up our contracts and protecting ourselves.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:I wish that they would have ironclad agreements with their clients and their customers to protect themselves. And that involves having terms that are favorable to them, that disclaim liability, that ensure that they are getting paid for their hard work. You know, there are tons of fabulous, free legal resources online, but they are very much subject to flaw and interpretation and chat GPT is not a perfect tool. And so I say that an upfront investment Pays dividends. You know, let me establish for you a solid template that you can use and build upon for the future. You don't even have to come back and consult me each and every time you want to tweak it, but let's get a really good template in place that you can use for a very long time and expand upon it. You're making this upfront investment, but it's saving you time and money and resources later on.
Speaking of saving you money, a piece of advice that I got pretty early on and have been passing along. So I'd love to know what you think of it is that when somebody's about to write their first design agreement, it can be really powerful to draft it yourself as the designer, before handing it off to an attorney. Uh, both because obviously it would save a lot of time away from the attorneys. You're not spending as much money, but even more importantly, because it helps the designer get their head around what they want to say and how they want to say it. How we want to run our businesses really has to come from within us and shouldn't be imposed by an outside party. How do you feel about that approach?
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, for my clients who you know, they have a specific budget in mind. I always, always want to respect that. So I ask them, do your homework, do you, the heavy lifting handed over to me when it's in the planning phase. have to put that many hours and energy into it. And that helps both of us because you know that you're handing over to me, what's important to you. I don't have to invent the wheel. I don't have to go back to you with, you know, long phone calls, trying to figure out what your goals are. I have them immediately. And then I can finesse it and fine tune it and make sure that the important provisions are in there for you. But for clients who you know, are building up their business and they are cost conscious of which we all should be, do your heavy lifting, do your homework, do your due diligence. And then I'm happy to take over and work with you very closely. And, you know, where I'm doing a template agreement, I provide that on a flat fee model so that they know up front. Okay. what exactly they're paying and what exactly they're receiving. Because sometimes lawyers get the bad rap that, you know, anytime you pick up the phone with a lawyer, start your timer. So you know exactly how much you're getting billed for. And I understand that obviously, you know, you don't want to receive an invoice that you don't know how they got there. So in many instances I can work with my clients on a flat fee arrangement. Um, And that typically applies to drafting templates, All of our trademark applications, copyright, those are all flat fee models. We don't bill hourly for those. We do an IP audit which encompasses a bunch of services also on a flat fee model. I find that for solopreneurs or smaller shops, that's just, you know, Much easier for them to digest. And they can fold that into their forecast and projections and know exactly how much they're spending versus getting a bill. I don't understand why this many minutes was spent on this and this hour was spent on that. It's just much easier to understand.
Speaking of things being digestible and easy to understand, how do you feel about legalees? Do these contracts and stuff really have to be written in such legal language.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:What a fun question. I love that. I think, to be perfectly honest with you, the lawyers that hide behind legalese probably shouldn't be client facing in the first place. When you're on the phone with a client, you want to speak to them like they are your peer, like they understand what you're saying. You don't want to intimidate them with all of these boiler points and provisions and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I really try to simplify and make things as easy for my clients as possible. My clients are professionals. They're business people. They're highly intelligent. And I want to explain things to them in a way that are understandable for them. When I do a client agreement, an engagement agreement for one of my interior designers, when I go over that agreement with them, I really take the time to educate them and break it down on a very digestible level because I don't want them to have to waste money coming back to me anytime one of their prospective clients has a question. question. I want them to be armed with information, understand what's in their agreement so they don't have to waste time coming back to me and they can just tell their client, Oh, this is what that means. Here's an example of that. This is why I put this into my engagement agreement. If that client has an issue with it and then, you know, they want to bring it to me and we can go back and forth. That's also happened, you know, a bunch of times as well. But I want my clients to be armed with information and know what's in their agreements. Not just, ah, my lawyer put this together, sign this. I really have no idea what's in there. What a waste of time.
And not just a waste of time, but it also does not put the designer in a very professional light. We are asking our clients to spend tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars under our advice and guidance. So for us to not be clear on what our design agreements mean, the legal document that we're having, our clients sign. That's just. In appropriate on a professional level, it does not shine us in a good light.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:No, it doesn't. It doesn't. so I want my clients to be many lawyers in that way and know exactly what the terms of their agreements are and not just trust that, you know, it was written by a professional. I want them to really understand.
I love that. And I'm sure our listeners are finding it very refreshing to hear a lawyer speak. So frankly, on this, and so understandably. Thank you so much for giving us your time today. It has been such a pleasure to learn from you.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:It's just, it's been such a joy speaking with you. I could go on about this for like hours and hours. I so respect the community that you've built. I think that it's fantastic. I am here for you and your clients and your community in any way. I love working with designers. they're such kind, giving, creative people. I love the passion that they have for their work. My interior designer is one of my best friends from childhood. I was her first client and and now she's like super cool and super successful and just fabulous. And I'm so happy for her. But the passion that she had in building my house into a home for me, my husband, my children. Want to protect that and I want to protect them.
I love that we started this whole conversation at this very high, like celebrity level with Ellen and Jonathan Adler and all these big names. But we ended with a personal connection between you and a childhood friend. Bringing these two industries together. On a really personal level. I just. Oh, that makes my little heart so happy. If anybody wants to be able to reach you, obviously all of your contact information will be in the show notes, but if anybody's listening and they just want to jot something down right now, what's the easiest way to reach you.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Please email me. I am an inbox zero person, so I will see it and respond to it. Nicole, N I C O L E at esca, E S C A dot legal. I am also on Instagram, Nicole Dolgan, E S Q, Esquire. And I respond there as well. So I am quick to respond and, and happy to engage with anybody.
Perfect. Thank you so much for your time today.
nicole-dolgon_2_01-15-2025_130011:Thank you so much. This was such a joy and hopefully helpful for your listeners to guide them through this process and support them.
Well, my friends, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Nicole. I'm sure it's not on everybody's top of mine, wishlist to give a lawyer their money. But when a lawyer is needed, they're really good at their job. And there's really not anybody else who can do the work a lawyer needs to do. I've worked with my own lawyer in Seattle, many times over the years for contract reviews. And just to figure out if I'm on the right path with my business. And those conversations were so satisfying because it helped me make sure that I did feel like I was going in the right direction and protecting myself as I built my business bigger and bigger and bigger over the years. As Nicole says, you do want to try and build a brain trust of people that you can go to and ask questions of, I, of course, would be honored to be part of that when you're thinking about your business and marketing strategy, your niche, and how you're going to make sure that you're standing out from the crowd. And I encourage you to reach out to Nicole if she resonated with you today. And do make sure that you've got a good CPA and bookkeeper on your team as well, because making sure you get the money right, is absolutely essential. Last, but not least if this conversation resonated with you, you know, I want to hear about it. So come find me over on Instagram at He seriously happy. That's B E seriously. Happy and let's be friends and celebrate all the things that we're doing together to succeed as entrepreneurs and interior designers. Bye for now.