Decision for dispute CAC-UDRP-108134

The Panel is not aware of any other legal proceedings which are pending or decided and which relate to the disputed domain name.

The Complainant is the owner of a number of trademark registrations for CHEWY (the “CHEWY trademark”), including the following representative registrations:

- the United States trademark CHEWY.COM with registration No. 4346308, registered on 4 June 2013 for services in International Class 35; and

- the United States trademark CHEWY with registration No. 5028009, registered on 23 August 2016 for services in International Class 35.

The Complainant was founded in 2011. It operates an online retail store and provides pet supplies and pet wellness-related services, including pet food, treats, supplies, and veterinary pharmaceutical products and services. The Complainant operates its official website at the domain name <chewy.com> registered on 18 April 2004, where it offers pet supplies and pet wellness-related services.

The disputed domain name was registered on 2 December 2025. At the time of filing of the Complaint, it resolved to a webshop offering various pet products and services with prices in US Dollars. The website displayed the title “Chewy Paws” and showed no information about the identity of its provider.

COMPLAINANT

The Complainant states that the disputed domain name is confusingly similar to the CHEWY trademark, because it fully incorporates it, adding only the dictionary word “paws” and the “.shop” generic Top-Level Domain (“gTLD”), which is insufficient to prevent a finding of confusing similarity with the Complainant’s trademark.

The Complainant asserts that the Respondent has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the disputed domain name, because it is not commonly known by it and has not been authorized by the Complainant to use the CHEWY trademark or the disputed domain name. The Complainant notes that the disputed domain name was registered long after the Complainant registered the CHEWY trademark and it gained extensive goodwill. The Complainant points out that the disputed domain name resolves to a commercial website that mimics the Complainant’s online storefront and uses pet-related imagery, product categories, and branding elements designed to evoke the CHEWY trademark, including unauthorized reproductions of the Complainant’s brand name. The Complainant points out that the Respondent’s website does not accurately disclose its lack of a relationship or affiliation with the Complainant. In the Complainant’s view, the Respondent is thus monetizing the disputed domain name by trading on the goodwill associated with the CHEWY trademark to mislead Internet users into believing that its website is operated by or affiliated with the Complainant.

The Complainant contends that the disputed domain name was registered and is being used in bad faith. It notes that the Respondent registered the disputed domain name very recently and long after the Complainant had registered the CHEWY trademark, and is using it to attract Internet users to the associated website, which offers competing products under the Complainant’s trademark. According to the Complainant, this shows that the Respondent has registered and used the disputed domain name with knowledge of the Complainant and with an intent to disrupt the Complainant’s business and to attract Internet users for commercial gain by creating a likelihood of confusion with the Complainant’s CHEWY trademark as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation or endorsement of the website to which the disputed domain name resolves.

The Complainant also maintains that the Respondent has engaged in a pattern of bad faith domain name registrations, and refers to the decision in ContextLogic Inc. v. Yaroslav Nevskiy, Claim No. FA2212002022421, which involved similar circumstances. According to the Complainant, that decision shows that the registration of the disputed domain name was not accidental or isolated, but forms part of a broader pattern of cybersquatting behavior.

RESPONDENT

The Respondent did not submit a Response in this proceeding.

The Complainant has, to the satisfaction of the Panel, shown the disputed domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the Complainant has rights (within the meaning of paragraph 4(a)(i) of the Policy).

The Complainant has, to the satisfaction of the Panel, shown the Respondent to have no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the disputed domain name (within the meaning of paragraph 4(a)(ii) of the Policy).

The Complainant has, to the satisfaction of the Panel, shown the disputed domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith (within the meaning of paragraph 4(a)(iii) of the Policy).

The Panel is satisfied that all procedural requirements under UDRP were met and there is no other reason why it would be inappropriate to provide a decision.

Pursuant to the Policy, paragraph 4(a), a complainant must prove each of the following to justify the transfer of a domain name:

(i) the domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the complainant has rights;

(ii) the respondent has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name; and

(iii) the domain name was registered and is being used in bad faith.

Identical or confusingly similar

The Complainant has provided evidence and has thus established its rights in the CHEWY trademark.

The Panel notes that a common practice has emerged under the Policy to disregard in appropriate circumstances the general Top-Level Domain (“gTLD”) section of domain names for the purposes of the comparison under the Policy, paragraph 4(a)(i). The Panel sees no reason not to follow the same approach here, so it will disregard the “.shop” gTLD section of the disputed domain name.

The disputed domain name incorporates the distinctive CHEWY trademark in combination with the dictionary word “paws”, and the CHEWY trademark is easily recognizable in it. There is a broad consensus that where the relevant trademark is recognizable within the disputed domain name, the addition of other terms (whether descriptive, geographical, pejorative, meaningless, or otherwise) would not prevent a finding of confusing similarity under the first element. The nature of such additional terms may however bear on assessment of the second and third elements.

Taking the above into account, the Panel finds that the disputed domain name is confusingly similar to the CHEWY trademark in which the Complainant has rights.

Rights and legitimate interests

While the overall burden of proof in UDRP proceedings is on the complainant, panels have recognized that proving a respondent lacks rights or legitimate interests in a domain name may result in the often-impossible task of “proving a negative”, requiring information that is often primarily within the knowledge or control of the respondent. As such, where a complainant makes out a prima facie case that the respondent lacks rights or legitimate interests, the burden of production on this element shifts to the respondent to come forward with relevant evidence demonstrating rights or legitimate interests in the domain name. If the respondent fails to come forward with such relevant evidence, the complainant is deemed to have satisfied the second element.

The Complainant contends that the Respondent has no rights or legitimate interests in the disputed domain names, because it is not commonly known by it and has not been authorized by the Complainant to use the CHEWY trademark, which was registered long before the disputed domain name. The Complainant points out that the disputed domain name resolves to a website that mimics the Complainant’s online storefront and uses pet-related imagery, product categories, and branding elements designed to evoke the CHEWY trademark, including unauthorized reproductions of the Complainant’s brand name, without disclosing the lack of affiliation with the Complainant.

The Complainant ha thus established a prima facie case that the Respondent has no rights or legitimate interests in the disputed domain name. The Respondent has not submitted a Response; it has not denied the contentions of the Complainant and has not provided any explanation of its actions.

In the Panel’s view, the circumstances of this case support a finding that the Respondent has no rights and legitimate interests in the disputed domain name. It represents a combination of the distinctive CHEWY trademark with the dictionary word “paws” and is registered in the “.shop” gTLD. This may create a false impression in Internet users that it resolves to a commercial online location that is affiliated to the Complainant. The associated website strengthens this false impression by offering various pet-related products that are identical or similar to the products offered by the Complainant, without including any disclaimer for the lack of relationship with the Complainant.

In the lack of any denial or evidence to the contrary, the above leads the Panel to the conclusion that the Respondent, being well aware of the goodwill of the Complainant’s CHEWY trademark, has registered the disputed domain name targeting this trademark in an attempt to exploit its goodwill for commercial gain by attracting Internet users to the website at the disputed domain name that sells products in competition with the Complainant. The Panel does not regard such conduct as giving rise to rights or legitimate interests in the disputed domain name.

Therefore, the Panel finds that the Respondent does not have rights or legitimate interests in the disputed domain name.

Bad faith

Paragraph 4(b) of the Policy lists four illustrative alternative circumstances that shall be evidence of the registration and use of a domain name in bad faith by a respondent.

The registration of the distinctive CHEWY trademark predates by 12 years the registration of the disputed domain name, which represents a combination of the same trademark with the dictionary word “paws” and the “.shop” gTLD, so Internet users may associate it with the Complainant. The associated website offers products that compete with the Complainant’s offerings, which shows that the Respondent is well aware of the Complainant and its CHEWY trademark. The Respondent’s website displays the logo “Chewy Paws” but does not mention that there is no relationship with the Complainant. The Respondent has not provided any plausible explanation of its choice of the disputed domain name and of its plans how to use it.

Considering all the above, the Panel finds that by registering and using the disputed domain name, the Respondent has intentionally attempted to attract, for commercial gain, Internet users to the associated website, by creating a likelihood of confusion with the Complainant’s CHEWY trademark as to the affiliation or endorsement of its website and of the products offered there. This supports a finding that the disputed domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith under paragraph 4(b)(iv) of the Policy.

The fact that the Respondent has been found to have acted in bad faith in similar circumstances in another dispute under the Policy (ContextLogic Inc. v. Yaroslav Nevskiy, FORUM Claim Number: FA2212002022421) provides additional support for the above finding, as it shows that the Respondent has engaged in a pattern of bad faith conduct.