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The Zest

The Florida trademark gap: 6 federal filings for every 100 new businesses

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In 2025, Florida recorded 670,459 new business filings. In the same calendar year, owners with a Florida address filed 41,650 federal trademark applications. That works out to about 6 federal trademark applications for every 100 new businesses, and the real rate for new businesses is lower, because the trademark count also includes companies that have been around for years.

I pulled these numbers because the same conversation keeps happening in my office. A founder forms an LLC on Sunbiz, builds a name and a following, and only then finds out the LLC never gave them the name. The numbers suggest that founder is the rule, not the exception.

The statewide numbers

Here is what the public records show for calendar year 2025.

  • New business filings in Florida: 670,459, according to the Florida Division of Corporations.
  • Federal trademark applications from Florida owners: 41,650, from a search of USPTO records for applications filed January 1 through December 31, 2025 with an owner address in Florida.
  • Active Florida business entities today: 4,129,182.
  • Active Florida state trademark registrations today: 19,247.

That last pair is the starkest. Florida has more than four million active business entities and fewer than twenty thousand active state trademark registrations. State registration is a different thing from federal registration, but the gap tells you how rarely a business name is protected as a brand in Florida's own records.

St. Pete, up close

St. Pete is one of the busiest places in Florida to start a business right now. Over the 30 days ending October 30, 2026, it was the second busiest city in the state for new business filings, with 4,799 filings by principal address. Only Miami had more, at 6,213. Orlando had 2,901 and Tampa had 2,267.

For all of 2025, owners with a St. Petersburg address filed 1,646 federal trademark applications.

One honest caution about the St. Pete filing count: a business's principal address on Sunbiz is often a mailbox or a registered agent's office rather than where the business actually operates, and downtown St. Pete has a lot of both. So treat the city ranking as a sign of how much formation runs through St. Pete, not a headcount of storefronts.

Why the gap exists

Most founders believe their LLC protects their business name. It doesn't. When Sunbiz approves your LLC name, it is telling you the name is distinguishable from other Florida entity names on its own records. That's all. It doesn't search federal trademarks, it doesn't search businesses in other states, and it doesn't give you ownership of the name as a brand. I wrote about this in more depth in the article on why your LLC is not your trademark.

Florida's own fictitious name instructions say the same thing about DBAs: registering a fictitious name does not reserve it or stop anyone else from registering the same name.

A federal trademark registration is the thing that gives you nationwide rights in a name for the goods or services you sell. It is a separate filing, with a separate government fee, through the USPTO.

What it costs a business on the wrong side of the gap

The cost of the gap shows up later, usually at the worst time. It looks like a demand letter after the logo is printed, an Amazon Brand Registry application that needs a trademark filing behind it, or a rebrand after a competitor in another state files first. Common-law rights from simply using a name do exist, but they are generally limited to the area where you actually use it. If you're planning to sell online, or anywhere beyond your own city, that limit matters.

If you're deciding whether your name is ready for a filing, the article on whether you need to trademark your business name walks through the questions, and the comparison of Florida and federal registration explains when a state filing is enough.

How these numbers were pulled

I want anyone, including reporters, to be able to check these figures. Here is exactly where each one came from.

  1. Florida new business filings, 670,459. The Florida Division of Corporations Yearly Statistics page, which counts new documents filed between January 1 and December 31 of each year.
  2. Active entities, 4,129,182, and active state trademark registrations, 19,247. The same Yearly Statistics page, which is updated quarterly.
  3. Federal applications from Florida owners, 41,650. The USPTO Trademark Search system, field search for owner state "FLORIDA" and filing date from 20250101 to 20251231, run on October 30, 2026. Each result is one application. One owner can file several applications, and the count includes established companies and individuals, not only new businesses.
  4. St. Pete federal applications, 1,646. The same USPTO search, limited to owner city "Saint Petersburg," "St. Petersburg" or "St Petersburg."
  5. City rankings for new business filings. Counts from the Florida Division of Corporations daily filing data for the 30 days ending October 30, 2026, by principal address, as compiled by Sunbiz Daily, which mirrors the state's public data files.

The comparison between new business filings and trademark applications is a ratio of two different things, not a measure of exactly how many new businesses filed a trademark. It is meant to show scale. If anything, it overstates how many new businesses are protected.

If you'd like to see the packages that start with a search, the details are on the services page, and the FAQs page answers most of what comes up before a first conversation.

Questions about your name? Email us at hello@citrus.legal, or book a paid 30-minute consultation (opens in a new tab) for advice on your specific situation.

Sources

This article is general information, not legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship.

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