Legal Question in Intellectual Property in Pennsylvania

Re: Logo Design

This is a good question, but because it involves the specifics of a potential dispute, it is the kind of thing you should discuss confidentially with a professional with whom you have an attorney-client relationship.

To give you some guidelines to help you begin such a discussion with counsel, if you had in fact designed the logo, then you might still hold a copyright for the logo, subject to any rights to it that you had transferred in writing to the company. Under the U.S. Supreme Court case of CCNV v. Reid, the designer of a graphic work who delivers a tangible embodiment of a graphic work does not necessarily transfer the copyright to the client at that point.

However, it sounds like someone else did the design work, so that wouldn't apply. When they received payment from you, to whom, if anyone, did they transfer ownership of the copyright to the design? Perhaps the designer still holds legal title to the copyright for the design. Perhaps because you paid, you might be entitled to have ownership of the copyright assigned to you. This is of course highly speculative and is not legal advice as to your particular situation.

It sounds like the big issue is that you want to be reimbursed for the cost of the design work, and from what you say, that sounds eminently reasonable. Even without a written agreement, one in your situation may be entitled to assert the benefit of a "contract implied in fact."