Trademarks

We are a very small UK company that has filed two trademarks in the UK. We did this ourselves and found the process fairly easy. One is an image the other is a wordmark - they are for the same thing. The wordmark is filed under several classifications (including areas we are not yet working in) but the image under one classifiation (our current core business). We make mountaineering rucksacks and later will move into related areas (tents, outdoor clothes etc).

We need to do soem international filings and would like advice on how to optimse costs/territories and on technical aspects of using the earlier priority date, and whether we need to use identical classifications (and same number) or whether we can submit in new territories under fewer classifications but still have the same priority date. We are a startup and our budget is very limited, so we need to optimise costs and need advice on when to trademark in certain territories (likleyhood of infringement etc). The territories we are considering are

USA
Europe (Germany, France, Switzerland , italy)
Korea
Japan

Is this your expert area or not really?

Tom