Buc-ee’s is known for its dozens of gas pumps. It’s known for its always-clean bathrooms. It’s known for its brisket sandwiches.
Increasingly, the Texas chain of super-sized convenience stores is known, too, for its lawsuits that seek to protect its “distinctive” beaver mark.
With its latest target – a decades-old Ohio convenience store – Buc-ee’s is also being cast as a bully. The lawsuit is generating backlash from residents, elected officials and even communities considering future Buc-ee’s locations.
“It’s very much a David vs. Goliath story,” said Nick Vehr, a Cincinnati public relations executive and former member of Cincinnati City Council.
Beavercreek market has been operating for decades
Beaver’s Mini Mart in Beavercreek, Ohio, just east of Dayton, started as Open Pantry around 1960, current owner Vik Boparai said. It went by Beaver’s when Boparai bought it in 2016. Around 2020, he installed a sign with a larger picture of a beaver.
In April 2026, Ohio’s first Buc-ee’s store opened just a dozen miles away in Huber Heights, which sits north of Dayton.
Boparai had no warning that he was in Buc-ee’s bullseye.
He learned the chain was suing him last weekend from news coverage.
Why did Buc-ee’s decide to sue Beaver’s Mini Mart in a community marked by multiple beavers? And why now?
“That’s the question,” Boparai said.
Buc-ee’s did not respond to a request for comment about the suit.
Alligators, ducks, dogs, moose targeted, too
In its lawsuit, Buc-ee’s accuses Beaver’s (via Hanes Road Carryout Inc., the business named for its street location) of creating unfair competition by infringing on Buc-ee’s trademarks.
At the heart of the suit, and about a dozen similar trademark cases Buc-ee’s has filed in the last decade, is the company’s cartoon beaver mascot, Buc-ee. The one with “wide eyes and a smile,” according to its lawsuit. The one as renowned as Mickey Mouse. The one “visible from the highway … on top of gas-pump canopies, on signage inside the stores, on an array of Buc-ee’s branded products.”
The one, the lawsuit says, that Beaver’s Mini Mart has used without permission from Buc-ee’s.
Boparai said he has not yet crafted a response to the claim, requested by Aug. 28. He’s looking for an attorney, who he’ll pay with more than $30,000 supporters have raised with a GoFundMe campaign.
Buc-ee’s has leveled the same kind of charges against a range of other businesses with anthropomorphic mascots.
In a 2025 lawsuit, it said a South Carolina apparel company’s beaver looked too much like Buc-ee’s.
In other years, it went after other critters: a smiling alligator used by a Texas bar, a duck used by a Missouri liquor store, a Texas gas station with a smiling dog logo. Earlier this year, Buc-ee’s sued Mickey’s Mart of Milan, Ohio, saying its moose looked too much like a Buc-ee’s beaver.
“It looks like Buc-ee’s is being very aggressive about how these cute little animals are represented,” said Vehr, the PR expert.
When it’s big vs. small, ‘community … can help,’ 9-year-old says
Beavercreek resident Kate Myers made her first stop at Beaver’s this week, to teach 9-year-old granddaughter Piper about lawyers and lawsuits.
Granddaughter and grandmother learned about the lawsuit on Facebook, which has exploded with Buc-ee’s postings since it was filed July 28.
Myers wanted Piper to know “large corporations have the power. Small people do not.”
Piper Myers took this away: “When big companies sue little companies, there’s a community that can help.”
That’s what’s happened in what Boparai calls the “Beaver community.” He’s seen the support on social media. He’s seen it on makeshift beaver logos all over town. He’s appreciated it in his store. “People are buying things,” he said. “My shelves are emptying out.”
The Myers did their part, buying gum, chips and pink lemonade. “I will be going back,” Kate Myers said.
Piper Myers contributed with a new logo for her grandma’s piano lesson business. It includes her hand-drawn beaver.
Lawsuits can help protect brand equity
Businesses have legitimate reasons to protect their trademarks, said Cincinnati trademark attorney Lori Krafte. They tell consumers who is – and who isn’t – behind a brand or service. It helps them to recall, “Oh, that’s the one I like. Oh, that’s the one I don’t like,” Krafte said.
Companies are smart to sue when some other entity hurts their sales or reputation by using their logo or another trademarked asset. “You definitely have to do something about that,” Krafte said.
That’s especially the case in the retail world, with thin profit margins and “hand-to-hand combat” for customers, added Vehr. With lawsuits, “what they’re protecting is their brand equity,” he said.
But lawsuits can backfire, Krafte said, when big companies go after small ones. “You look like you’re being so heavy-handed,” she said.
Corporate executives and their investors know they can face criticism for picking on the little guy, Vehr added. “They have to be willing to risk alienating a few customers to retain the majority,” he said.
Will Buc-ee’s hold on to its key to Huber Heights?
When Buc-ee’s opened in Huber Heights, the community celebrated. The crowds were huge. The chain picked up $1 million in first-day sales.
“Up until last week, it’d gone incredibly well,” Mayor Jeff Gore said.
This week, Gore sent texts to Buc-ee’s contacts to let them know that a lawsuit is not “worth the negative backlash and harm you are doing to your reputation nationally.”
“We think this lawsuit is ridiculous and we hope it goes away,” he said.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, and Ohio Sen. Willis E. Blackshear Jr., a Dayton Democrat, made the same request. TV host John Oliver has been baiting Buc-ee’s to come after him. In Mansfield in northern Ohio, some residents want to keep out a Buc-ee’s, with about 2,200 signing a petition saying the store would harm the environment and safety.
Gore gave Buc-ee’s founder Arch “Beaver” Aplin III a key to the city at the store’s grand opening.
He joked then that “I’d hate to be the first city to ask for it back.”
Just days after Buc-ee’s sued Beaver’s, Gore said he is considering whether to make that request.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Ohio ‘Beaver community’ rallies around a mini-mart sued by Buc-ee’s
Reporting by Patricia Gallagher Newberry, Cincinnati Enquirer / Cincinnati Enquirer
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Patricia Gallagher Newberry, Cincinnati Enquirer | USA TODAY Network
