Business Name verses Brand

[nicknack]

Hey guys,

I wanted to know if anyone knows how exactly it works with a business name and different brands under that business. For example like old navy, gap and banana rep. are all owned by the same company...but do you have to register that "Brand" as a new llc or business entity OR do you just name you business..."Business X LLC" and then you create as much different brand names and varying ventures under that name.

I'm not sure if this is making sense...if not let me know so I can try again.. : ...Thanks guys

[Antdizzle]

I'm sure that trademarking the brand is the only thing you need to do. No entity required.

[Jerimi]

Its not quite that simple... but close!

When you register an S or C corporation (MY Entity INC) or an LLC, they are treated like a seperate entity, or almost like a person.

So say I have My Entity INC registered and I want to run the businesses old navy, gap and banana rep. Just like anywhere else, you need to be able to write a check out to gap - Pay bills as gap etc.

Thus someone at My Entity Inc will register a DBA (doing business as) just like a person would. Id register My Entity DBA "the Gap" etc....You can register as many of these as you like. It gives the corporation the legal ability to do business under that name.

There are other ways to structure such things, but thats the simplest - and very common. The other ways a company can sort of "own" another company involves owning a majority of shares in another, and stuff that you would do better looking up in a library to get the low-down on, as there are many many variations.

[Antdizzle]

Too add to what Jerimi said.

The examples that you have given nick are businesses that were acquired. So Old Navy, Gap, Banana Republic were all different businesses and now they belong to the same parent company. They could still have their original entity just owned by the parent company.