Recently, Isle of Skye Sea Salt was contacted by a company in the United States that has held the trademark Celtic Sea Salt® for over forty years. Their concern was clear: that the use of the phrase “Celtic sea salt” in certain blog posts on our website could, unintentionally, create confusion or dilute the distinctiveness of their registered brand.
We want to begin by affirming something essential: we fully respect intellectual property law. As a small artisanal business ourselves, we know how important it is to protect the fruit of one’s labour, and we acknowledge the rights associated with a registered trademark.
At the same time, this situation raises wider questions about how language operates when it touches both commerce and culture.
A Word Rooted in Culture, Not Commerce
The word “Celtic” does not originate in marketing. It is a historical, cultural, and geographical reality. Across Europe, “Celtic” designates communities and traditions that are still alive today: in Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Cornwall, Brittany, and Galicia.
The Isle of Skye, where we hand-harvest our sea salt, is unmistakably part of this Celtic world. When we refer to this heritage, it is not to claim a product category or to imitate a brand, but simply to describe where we are rooted – geographically, historically, and culturally.
Respecting Trademarks Without Silencing Heritage
The rights granted by trademark law are legitimate. Yet we believe there must also be a balance when those rights touch on expressions of shared heritage.
We do not contest the registration of Celtic Sea Salt®. But we ask an open question: should a commercial entity, located thousands of miles away, be able to restrict the use of a word that describes our own culture and identity? Especially when we do not use that word as a brand name, nor on our packaging, nor in our product labels.
This is not about confrontation. It is about acknowledging that words like “Celtic” cannot be fully privatised. They belong to the languages, histories, and landscapes that gave them life.
The Risk of Cultural Appropriation
When cultural or geographic expressions are interpreted in an exclusively commercial sense, something important is at stake.
We use this wording carefully, but it highlights a familiar dynamic: what was once a shared cultural marker becomes framed as exclusive, and what was once a lived identity becomes something to be defended against legal restriction.
Our Commitment: Clarity, Respect, and Authenticity
In a spirit of respect, Isle of Skye Sea Salt has already undertaken a careful review of its website. We have revised our blog articles to ensure that we do not present “Celtic Sea Salt” as a generic salt category, thereby avoiding any risk of misleading readers or causing confusion with a competitor’s registered brand.
Instead, we clarify that our product is Pure Scottish Sea Salt, harvested on the Isle of Skye, a region of Celtic origin.
At the same time, we will continue to situate our work within the wider Celtic heritage of which Skye is a part. Because identity is not a brand: it is a memory, a land, a language, and a sea wind carried across centuries.
Our hope is for dialogue marked by respect on both sides. Protecting a brand is legitimate. But so too is acknowledging that certain words belong to everyone – to cultures, to places, to communities that continue to live them every day.
At Isle of Skye Sea Salt, we remain committed to producing a salt that is not only pure and sustainable, but also deeply rooted in the heritage of our island. In doing so, we aim to honour both the letter of the law and the spirit of our culture.