Cartoon stick figure pointing towards a chalkboard with “Washburn’s Gold Medal” written in large chalk letters — representing a blog post about the Washburn’s Gold Medal word mark.

Trademark: Washburn’s Gold Medal

First Used: August 1880

First Registered: April 1886

Current Owner: GENERAL MILLS MARKETING, INC. [1]

Trademark Type: traditional trademark; word mark

Primarily Associated With: flour [2]

Generic Phrase: flour, as in Washburn’s Gold Medal® brand flour

Similar Trademarks: GOLD MEDAL® for wheat flour [3] and dry flour-based mixes like biscuit mixes, brownie mixes, and pancake mixes [4]; and GOLD MEDAL SUPERLATIVE® for wheat flour [5]

Brief (and likely incomplete) History: [6]

Washburn’s Gold Medal® is a significant piece of trademark history – it is the oldest still-active word mark registration in the United States.

Washburn's Gold Medal brand is closely tied to the development of the flour milling industry in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Cadwallader C. Washburn, the company's founder, built his first flour mill in 1866 on the Mississippi River at St. Anthony Falls in Minneapolis, Minnesota. In 1880, Washburn's flour won the top three prizes at the First Millers International Exhibition in Cincinnati, Ohio, including the coveted gold medal. To capitalize on this success, Washburn began branding their best grade of flour as Washburn’s Gold Medal or Gold Medal for short.

The Washburn’s Gold Medal brand has been used consistently since then, with the exception of a one year break due to World War II: In 1946, the US government issued a war food order requiring millers to include the coarser, darker parts of the wheat kernel in order to make wheat supplies last longer. Since this degraded the quality of flour, the Washburn’s Gold Medal trademark was removed from flour bags until 1947, when the war food order was finally lifted.

[1] General Mills, https://www.generalmills.com/; Gold Medal, https://www.generalmills.com/food-we-make/brands/gold-medal.

[2] USPTO, US Trademark Registration No. 13,253, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=70013253&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[3] USPTO, US Trademark Registration No. 573,406, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=71618738&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[4] USPTO, US Trademark Registration No. 1,544,732, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=73754514&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[5] USPTO, US Trademark Registration No. 631,875, available at https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=71685574&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch.

[6] Gold Medal Flour’s History Of Quality, GOLD MEDAL, available at https://www.goldmedalflour.com/our-story.