Cartoon stick figure pointing to a chalkboard with “Play-Doh” written in large chalk letters — representing a blog post about the Play-Doh word mark.

Trademark: PLAY-DOH [1]

First Use: May 1955

Current Owner: Hasbro, Inc. [2]

Original Owner: Kutol Products Company, dba Rainbow Crafts Company

Trademark Type: traditional trademark; word mark

Primarily Known For: plastic type modeling compound for children’s use

Generic Phrase: putty; modeling compound, as in PLAY-DOH® Brand putty

Also a trademark for: equipment for playing parlor-type amusement games [3], entertainment and educational services [4], among other products and services

Brief (and likely incomplete) History [5]

PLAY-DOH® putty was first developed by Kutol Products in the early 1900’s as a wallpaper cleaner, primarily for cleaning and removing soot from the surface of wallpaper. Once one of the largest wallpaper cleaner manufacturers in the world, the company began to struggle in the mid-1900’s as society transitioned to cleaner formers of energy to heat and power households.

In the 1950’s, two employees from the company received a call that would change the fortunes of the cleaning putty forever. A nursery school teacher and family relative had recently read a newspaper article describing how the wallpaper cleaning putty could be used by children to make art modelling projects. She suggested they start marketing their product as a toy putty, and even thought of a name: Play-Doh.

Today, the Play-Doh brand has become so famous that even the smell of Play-Doh putty has become a trademark!

[1] USPTO, U.S. Trademark Registration No. 6,50,035, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=650035&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[2] PLAY-DOH Brand, Hasbro Shop, available at https://shop.hasbro.com/en-us/play-doh.

[3] USPTO, U.S. Trademark Registration No. 1,023,855, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=1023855&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[4] USPTO, U.S. Trademark Registration No. 5,722,540, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=5722540&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[5] The Accidental Invention of Play-Doh, Smithsonian Magazine, posted November 12, 2019, and available at https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/accidental-invention-play-doh-180973527/; Who Invented Play-Doh, ThoughtCo., last updated January 20, 2020, and available at https://www.thoughtco.com/who-invented-play-doh-1992323.