Whiskey-a-no-no: dog toy cannot mimic Jack Daniel’s, US supreme court rules

Justices unanimously reject lower court ruling that defined Bad Spaniel chew toy as ‘expressive work’ exempt from trademark law

The US supreme court on Thursday gave a boost to Jack Daniel’s in its trademark dispute with a dog accessory company that sold a parody chew toy resembling the distiller’s widely recognized black-label whiskey bottle.

The 9-0 decision written by Justice Elena Kagan, from the liberal wing of the bench, threw out a lower court’s ruling that the pun-laden Bad Spaniels vinyl chew toy sold by an Arizona company called VIP Products is an “expressive work” protected by the US constitution’s first amendment. Jack Daniel’s Properties Inc is owned by the Louisville, Kentucky-based Brown-Forman Corp.