Intellectual Property Policy

Last updated: November 14, 2026

This Intellectual Property Policy sets out who owns what on scrubink.shop, what Scrub Ink will and will not put on a product, how the text you type on a personalised item is treated, and how to raise a trademark, name or design concern. Copyright takedown notices have their own page: DMCA.

1. What belongs to Scrub Ink

The Scrub Ink name and logo, the product designs, the product images, the homepage directory board with its floors and units, the days side / nights side split, the credential line guide, the product descriptions and the text of the help and policy pages are the work of Scrub Ink and are protected by copyright, trademark and related laws.

The idea of printing a unit name on a sweatshirt is not ours to own, and we do not claim it. What we claim is our own execution: the specific artwork, lettering arrangements, layouts and wording you see on this site.

2. What you may and may not do with our content

2.1 You may

• View and print pages for your own use, for example to pin the whole-unit order steps on the break-room board while you collect sizes.
• Share a link to a product or page with co-workers, in a group message or by email.
• Quote a short extract with a link back to the page it came from.
• Photograph an item you bought and show it wherever you like. It is your item.

2.2 You may not

• Copy our designs, product images or descriptions onto another store, a marketplace listing or a print service.
• Take a Scrub Ink design to a local printer to run more copies for the unit. If the floor wants twelve more, each person adds a line to an order here.
• Use the Scrub Ink name or logo, or anything confusingly similar, in a way that suggests you are us or are connected with us.
• Bulk-download the site with automated tools, other than normal search engine indexing.
• Build new products from our artwork without written permission.

3. Original designs only

Each of the 20 products carries a design drawn for this store. The visual language is deliberately plain: stacked lines of type, floor numbers, unit names, the look of the directory board by the elevator and the whiteboard at the nurses’ station. We do not adapt designs found on other shops, and we do not decorate with medical symbols.

Unit names and abbreviations such as ICU, Step-Down, Tele, Med-Surg, L&D, NICU, PACU, ED and Float Pool are everyday working vocabulary used on every floor in the country. They belong to no one, and they are the only kind of “name” our own designs carry.

4. What we never put on a product

These are fixed rules. They apply to products, to the logo and site artwork, and to the demo text in product images.

Demo names in product images are fictional. “Jordan Lee, BSN, RN”, “Sam Rivera” and “Alex Kim” are placeholders that show how a line stacks; they are not customers and they are not real people’s endorsements. Demo units are generic: ICU, 4 WEST, TELE. You will not see a real hospital’s name in a product image.

We also do not use the brand names of garment or drinkware makers to describe our items. The quarter-zip is a quarter-zip pullover and the tumbler is a tumbler.

5. Certification and exam marks

Many certification letters, and the names of the licensing exams, are registered marks of the organisations behind them. We keep two things separate.

• Our designs. Our own artwork, product titles and product images never show those marks. A gift in Pinning & First Shift says “passed the boards”, not the name of the exam. A design does not use a certification’s letters as a graphic.
• Your credential line. When you type your own certification letters into the Credentials field, you are stating a credential you hold, on your own item. That is your line, not our design. We print the letters you enter; we do not verify, grant or imply any licence, degree or certification, and printing them does not mean the certifying body has anything to do with this store.

So a nurse who has just added letters after her name can order a new Stacked Name & Credentials Crewneck with the updated line. What she cannot do is ask us to make the certifying body’s logo part of it.

6. Personalisation text and other people’s trademarks

Three fields exist on the five personalised products: Unit, up to 10 characters; Name, up to 22 characters; Credentials, up to 24 characters. They are meant for exactly those three things.

We may decline personalisation text that uses someone else’s trademark. In practice that means:

• “4 WEST”, “TELE”, “M/B” or “FLOAT” in the Unit field is fine. A hospital’s or health system’s name, initials used as its brand, or its tagline is not what the field is for, and we may decline it.
• A person’s name in the Name field is fine. A brand name, a team name, a character name or a celebrity’s name may be declined.
• Degree, licence and certification letters that you hold are fine in the Credentials field. A company slogan or a product name is not a credential and may be declined.

If we decline a line, we email you and say which line and why. You can send replacement text or have that item cancelled and refunded. We would rather ask than print something that gets you a difficult conversation with your manager or a letter from a trademark owner. The limits of what we print are also set out in the Terms of Service.

The text you type stays yours. You give us permission to use it for one purpose: to make, deliver and support your order. We do not reuse a customer’s name or credential line in advertising or as demo text.

7. No affiliation, and no approval implied

Scrub Ink is an independent online store. It is not affiliated with, sponsored by or endorsed by any hospital, school, health system, board of nursing, certifying body or professional association. Names of roles and units appear on the site because they describe who the items are for, not because any organisation has approved them.

The same goes for colour. The “colour your floor wears” picker on the homepage offers Navy, Charcoal, Black, Ceil Blue, Ash Grey and White. Those are garment colours. They are not any employer’s official colours, and choosing one does not make an item part of a work dress code. Check your own unit’s rules before you order for work.

And the same goes for the product itself. Despite the word in our name, this store does not sell scrubs or work uniforms. A printed name on a key tag or tumbler is a gift, not workplace identification and not an official credential.

8. How to report a trademark, name or design concern

If you believe something on the site uses your trademark, your organisation’s name, your registered design or your likeness, email support@scrubink.shop with the subject line “IP concern”. Include:

1. Your name, your organisation and your role, or your relationship to the rights owner.
2. The right you are relying on: for example the mark and where it is registered, with the registration number if you have it.
3. The exact address of each page concerned and what on that page you mean.
4. A short explanation of why you believe it infringes.
5. A statement that the information you have given is accurate.

You can also write by post to Scrub Ink, 1511 Ahuawa Loop, Honolulu, HI 96816, US. For a copyright claim about a specific image, drawing or passage of text, use the six-point notice described on the DMCA page instead.

9. What happens after a report

We reply within 24 hours on business days to confirm that we have your report. We then compare the report with the page. If the concern is valid, we remove or change the content and tell you what was done. If we need more information, we ask before deciding. If we disagree, for example because the only overlap is a generic unit name, we say so and give our reasons. We have not set a fixed number of days for a decision; you can ask for an update on the same email thread at any time.

If your report concerns a line typed by a customer on a personalised item, there is usually nothing public to remove, but we can decline future orders that use the mark. Customer details are not handed over in response to a report unless the law requires it. See the Privacy Policy.

10. Ideas, requests and feedback

Customers often write with suggestions: add a unit to the directory board, offer a design for respiratory therapists, make a nights version of a days tee. We read them. If you send an idea, you agree that we may use it freely and without payment, and that sending it does not create any shared ownership of a design that follows.

Please do not send us artwork belonging to someone else, or your employer’s logo, and ask us to print it. We do not take custom artwork uploads; the only customer input we print is the three text fields.

11. Permission requests

If you want to use a Scrub Ink image or design for something this page does not allow, for example in a unit newsletter, a school yearbook page or a local news piece, ask first. Email us with what you want to use, where it will appear and for how long. Permission is given in writing by email or not at all; silence is not permission.

12. Contact

Questions about this policy, reports and permission requests all go to support@scrubink.shop. Support is by email only. For order questions, see Contact Us or the FAQs.