Jessica A. Ekhoff

Jessica specializes in trademark, advertising, and copyright law.  Jessica has extensive litigation experience, securing wins for clients before federal district and appellate courts across the country, the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, the National Advertising Division of the Better Business Bureau, and the National Advertising Review Board.  Her cases often involve working with expert witnesses on survey design, including likelihood of confusion, genericness, secondary meaning, and primary significance surveys.

Jessica’s clients hail from a wide range of industries, including food and beverage, health and fitness, fashion, technology, pharmaceutical, automotive, and consumer packaged goods.

Jessica’s recent victories include briefing and arguing a successful appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit; obtaining a preliminary injunction – including a product recall – in a trademark infringement case; securing the early dismissal of a design patent and trade dress infringement lawsuit regarding women’s ballet flat shoes; and successfully defending a sports reporter against a breach of contract claim filed by her former manager with the American Arbitration Association.

Complementing her litigation work, Jessica’s practice also includes claim substantiation for digital and print advertising; managing influencers, including preparation of contracts and oversight of influencer programs; product packaging review; drafting contest and sweepstakes rules, including for social media promotions; trademark counseling, clearance, and prosecution; and international trademark portfolio management.

Jessica helped a fitness technology start-up expand their brand into numerous product categories in jurisdictions across the world; manages the fast-growing trademark portfolio of a leading better-for-you food brand, and successfully obtained federal registrations for numerous non-traditional trademarks, including color marks and motion marks.

Outside the office, Jessica is actively involved in the Chicago community.  She is a mentor at The University of Chicago’s Polsky Exchange, a startup incubator and resource center for local entrepreneurs.  She serves on the Board of Directors and co-chairs the Programming Committee of The Coalition for Women’s Initiatives in Law, where she has planned in-person and virtual events related to business development, performance reviews, communication in intergenerational teams, and financial literacy.  Jessica is also on the Associate Board of Lawyers for the Creative Arts, where she works to provide free legal resources to Chicago’s creative community.

On the weekends, you can find Jessica keeping tabs on the international figure skating circuit; listening to a podcast from her ever-growing list of favorites; baking; hitting the links with fellow members of the LPGA Amateur Golf Association; or reading at a neighborhood coffee shop with a vanilla latte in hand.