Snoop Dogg attends Olympic Games at Bercy Arena on July 28, 2024 in Paris, France. (Photo by Arturo Holmes/Getty Images)
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Snoop Dogg (Calvin Broadus) has obtained approval from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for his Los Angeles pot shop called SWED, which stands for “Smoke Weed Every Day,” even though his shop is supplying product with more than 30% THC potency.
Trademarks for businesses selling full-dosage marijuana are strictly off limits under federal law, yet Snoop Dogg and a few others have found a legit way to get over.
Many music celebrities with canna-businesses – like Willie Nelson, the estate of Bob Marley and Wiz Khalifa – sell weed and paraphernalia in states where it’s legalized, but they haven’t obtained federal trademarks on their weed businesses, in the same way purveyors of alcohol do.
But Snoop is following the path of companies like STIIIZY, a nationwide chain of pot stores with trademarks for very low and federally-legal 0.3% THC-dosed items and merchandise that doesn’t touch the plant at all. But then they’re stocking the dull-dosed items right beside a panoply of full potency pot products in their inhouse and online establishments.
Snoop, in addition to being one of the best-known rappers ever, is a rap-capitalist with robust side hustles including not only his Los Angeles dispensary but also an Amsterdam weed cafe.
According to a public filing, Snoop’s holding company, Dr. ETC Holdco, LLC, has filed for more than a dozen trademarks for cannabis-related and other goods and services in 50 countries outside the U.S. – including the United Kingdom, European Union (with its 27 member countries), Israel, Jamaica, Japan and Vietnam among other countries.
The Trick To Getting A Federal Weed Trademark
Snoop tried for two trademarks: one for the full name “Smoke Weed Every Day” and one only for the acronym SWED. The former was shot down in March, even though both applications were for the same services: running a cannabis dispensary.
Both applications requested a trademark for services related to the sale of product with no more than 0.3% THC content, which is currently considered legal for sale over the counter, although that may change in November (more on that below).
Snoop’s SWED website advertises product with THC levels ten times higher than the 0.3% level indicated in both trademark applications. But the USPTO is not the DEA and doesn’t seem to mind the sale of mind-altering controlled substances alongside federally lawful low dose stuff.
If the application receives no public objections this week, and none are currently shown on the USPTO website, Snoop is expected to have his trademark for SWED dispensaries listed in the Principal Register of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in about 11 weeks.
The SWED trademark will protect the name of Snoop’s dispensary not the name of any particular weed strain sold there, but either way he’ll stop copycats from palming off their supply as if it were his, and with the weight of federal trademark law behind him.
Why “Smoke Weed Every Day” Got Snuffed Out
On March 10, 2026, Snoop’s other trademark application for the slogan “Smoke Weed Every Day” got shot down by the Trademark Office, even though it was for a cannabis dispensary just like SWED, which is merely an acronym for it.
The reasons for the rejection are strange and not what you might expect.
The notice of rejection first rejects the slogan trademark because its a “commonplace slogan.” But the argument that a “commonplace slogan” can’t function as a trademark is undercut by countless iconic slogan trademarks like “Just Do It” (Nike), “I’m Lovin’ It” (McDonald’s) and “Think Different” (Apple).
The second reason for rejection is that the application supposedly violates the Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act (FDCA). Not the Controlled Substances Act that governs the Drug Enforcement Agency, but a law that governs advertising of food additives.
What?
Yes, the USPTO rejected the trademark because it found that “the identification indicates the goods or services feature foods that contain Delta-9 THC, which constitute food additives,” and “Any food additive that has not been approved for its intended use in food is an unsafe food additive, and the use of an unsafe food additive in food creates an ‘adulterated food,’ which is prohibited under the FDCA.”
It’s a strange rabbit hole indeed. But at least canna-businesses can rejoice that the USPTO only busted Snoop’s longer trademark on minor and quite innocuous charges. And they can be euphoric that he’s getting the SWED trademark for the same dispensary and free and clear, it appears.
President Trump helped out weed purveyors somewhat when he signed an executive order on December 18, 2025, directing the DoJ and the DEA to move marijuana from Schedule I (no accepted medical use) to Schedule III (accepted medical use), which could allow more federal trademarks for weed to be granted.
The executive order is simply a directive and not the law, as of now. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and DEA head Terry Cole, or whoever takes their places, would need to get formal paperwork through the Office of Management and Budget review, and then obtain publication in the Federal Register as a final step, unless litigation drags down the process.
So until it passes through those bureaucratic hoops, the Trump order, as popular as it is with pro-pot proponents like comic Bill Maher, is just smoke and mirrors.
Unless and until the federal bureaucracy makes Trump’s executive order into a federal rule, the sale of the Schedule III substance is illegal under the federal Controlled Substances Act, with penalties ranging as high as 10 years to life in prison and a $10 million fine.
It would be unlikely that a DEA spook would arrest Snoop and shutter his shop in normal times, but these are unpredictable times.
Reading Trump’s Smoke Signals
With cannabis, as with any issue, predicting Trump’s policy is tricky.
On one hand, Trump’s December 18, 2025 executive order would, if its ever implemented, reschedule and decriminalize cannabis products, allowing for federal tax deductions that are currently banned, which would be a huge boost to the beleaguered cannabis industry. Weed companies could then obtain federal trademarks and roll out nationwide advertising, under Federal Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act and 21 C.F.R. § 202.1, at least for prescription pot products to start with, perhaps later leading to the kind of broad advertising policy that alcohol enjoys.
But on the other hand, Trump raised anxiety among cannabis entrepreneurs and consumers when he signed a hemp ban under this year’s Agriculture Appropriations Bill, which actually re-criminalizes so-called Delta 8 goods (about half the dosage of standard Delta 9 product), which are currently available not only in pot shops but also at truck stops. Those products must disappear from shelves as of November 12, 2026, thanks to Trump’s signature.
This uncertainty is a buzz kill for the $28 billion bud biz, but pot optimists still envision an inevitable world of edible, smokeable and drinkable weed products as widespread and legit as bottles from the $254 billion U.S. booze business.
That must be why the boss of hip-hop filed his longshot trademark applications for “Smoke Weed Every Day,” SWED and a third one called “Snoops Buds,” and not just in the U.S.
Snoop Dogg’s trademark legal counsel did not respond to a request for comment.
The author further explores Snoop’s cannabis trademark ventures on his podcast Shmoozic Biz, where he’s joined by trademark attorney Rami Yanni.
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