Salon Trademark in Nepal: Classes 3 and 44 for Beauty Businesses
Salon trademark Nepal: Class 44 covers the beauty services, Class 3 the product line — how a Nepali salon files both, what it costs, and the naming traps to avoid.
A successful Nepali salon becomes two businesses: the service on New Road or in Lazimpat, and the product line — the soap, cream or hair oil sold under the same name. Those are two different Nice classes, two separate applications, and two different renewal clocks at the Department of Industry.
Salons that understand this early file once, correctly. Salons that do not discover it when a competitor opens two doors away with the same name.
In short
A salon trademark in Nepal splits across two classes: Class 44 for the beauty and hair services themselves, and Class 3 for any own-brand cosmetics, soaps or hair preparations. Each class is a separate single-class application — NPR 1,000 to file and NPR 5,000 to register per class in current practice — with a 7-year renewable term and a roughly 90-day opposition window after Bulletin publication.
Two businesses, two classes: services and products
Class 44 covers the service the client sits down for — medical and beauty care services for people. Class 3 covers the preparations on the shelf — soaps, perfumery, cosmetics, hair lotions. A salon that only offers services files Class 44; the moment it bottles its own hair oil or retails its own cream line, Class 3 becomes the class where the product brand lives.
The distinction is not academic. A Class 44 registration does not, by itself, stop someone selling a 'your-brand' soap — the product sits outside the registered class.
Class 44 first, Class 3 when the line is real
The sequencing discipline mirrors the single-class structure: file where revenue is. A Class 3 filing for a product line that exists only in conversation buys examination risk and dead renewals.
| When | Class | Trigger | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| At launch | 44 | The salon opens; services under the brand | NPR 1,000 filing + NPR 5,000 registration |
| At the product line | 3 | Own cosmetics, soaps or hair preparations go on sale | NPR 1,000 filing + NPR 5,000 registration |
| Every 7 years | Both | Renewal on Schedule 2(f) | NPR 3,500 per class |
Choosing a name that survives examination
Salon naming runs into two recurring traps. The first is descriptiveness: names built on generic beauty words — variants of 'beauty', 'parlour', 'glow' — attract objections because they describe the services rather than distinguish them. The second is personal names: many salons trade on the founder's name, which is registrable, but a personal-name mark can collide with earlier filings by namesakes, and examiners weigh that overlap in Class 44.
Distinctive, invented or suggestive names clear examination faster and are easier to enforce. And in a bilingual market, check the Devanagari version of whatever you choose — cross-script sound-alikes count as conflicts under Section 18(1).
Filing the salon trademark in Nepal at the DOI
Search before you paint the signboard
Screen the name across the DOI's published records — both scripts, phonetic variants included — while the lease is being signed, not after.
Confirm the class for each activity
Services in 44, preparations in 3; the class notes settle anything in between.
File, publish, register
The Schedule 1(c) application takes four specimens of the mark; the mark publishes in the Industrial Property Bulletin for a roughly 90-day opposition window; then the NPR 5,000 registration fee and the certificate.
Keeping the registration working
The certificate starts a 7-year term renewable indefinitely, and two obligations keep it healthy. Use: the mark should be in genuine use within a year of registration — signage, price lists, product labels all count — because a registration unused for a year is exposed to a non-use inquiry under Section 18C. Renewal: file within 35 days of each expiry at NPR 3,500 per class, with a 6-month grace period carrying a NPR 1,000 fine.
For salons that grow into chains, those same registrations are what license the second and third branches — and what a franchise buyer's diligence will ask to see.
Want this handled for your brand?
IP Watch monitors new trademark publications in Nepal and alerts you to potentially conflicting marks — with the context needed to review them.
This article is general information, not legal advice.