.chef

1. Mission and Purpose of the Applied-for gTLD .chef gives the culinary world a naming space built around the people behind the food, not just the venues that serve it. Where many food-related addresses center on restaurants, dishes, or cuisines, .chef foregrounds the practitioner: the trained professional whose name is their reputation. A personal chef, a rising sous chef, or a celebrated restaurateur can claim a web address that reads instantly as a credential and a portfolio rather than a generic listing. The namespace is designed to help culinary professionals turn a name into a recognizable presence. A chef building a catering business, publishing recipes, teaching classes, or promoting a cookbook can anchor all of that activity under a single address that signals craft and authority at a glance. For instructors and culinary schools, .chef offers a clear way to present teaching profiles and programs. For ingredient, equipment, and food brands courting the trade, it provides a memorable home for chef-focused content, partnerships, and demonstrations. By centering identity rather than location or menu, .chef helps practitioners be discovered for who they are and what they cook. It separates the working professional from the venue they may move between over a career, giving chefs an address that travels with them. The result is a focused, credible space where the culinary trade can establish presence, share work, and connect with diners, employers, students, and collaborators who are specifically looking for culinary talent. Intended Registrants: Professional chefs, restaurateurs, private and personal chefs, catering operators, culinary schools and instructors, recipe developers, food writers, and kitchen product or ingredient brands serving the culinary trade. Related Activities Supporting the Purpose: • Awareness-building among culinary associations, hospitality schools, and food media. • Registrar distribution to reach independent chefs and food businesses. • Registrant education on building a clear, memorable culinary web address. • Community outreach to cooking schools, restaurant groups, and catering networks. • Responsible registry operations consistent with standard practice. 2. Sustainability of the Purpose Over Time The enduring relevance of .chef rests on the chef as a professional vocation. Cooking at a professional level is a recognized craft with formal training, apprenticeship traditions, titles, and a defined career ladder that has persisted across generations and culinary cultures. The role of the chef as the authority who directs a kitchen and stakes a personal reputation on the food does not depend on any particular restaurant model, cuisine fashion, or media platform; it is rooted in the structure of the profession itself. Because the value of .chef is tied to professional identity, it remains meaningful as the surrounding industry shifts. Restaurants open and close, dining trends cycle, and the channels chefs use to reach audiences change, yet the practitioner and the credential attached to their name carry forward. A chef may move from line cook to executive chef, from a restaurant kitchen to a private clientele, consulting practice, teaching role, or product line. Across each of those transitions, a name-based culinary address remains an accurate and useful representation of who they are. Culinary schools graduate new cohorts every year, apprenticeship and stage traditions keep producing trained practitioners, and the global growth of hospitality sustains a steady population of working chefs entering the trade. Each generation has reason to establish a professional presence early and maintain it throughout a career, which supports ongoing and renewing registration rather than a one-time burst of interest.

".CHEF" is proposed as an open namespace for culinary professionals, food enthusiasts, and anyone who has mastered their craft. Restaurants, catering services, personal chef businesses, culinary schools, food media creators, and recipe platforms all represent core registrant categories. The word "chef," however, has always carried a meaning beyond the kitchen: it connotes mastery, precision, and creative command of a discipline. A software architect known for elegant system design, a financial strategist known for complex deal-making, or an athlete known for a signature skill are each, in the vernacular, operating at a chef's level in their field. ".CHEF" is designed to serve both the culinary world that anchors the string and the broader community of people who bring that same level of craft and command to what they do. Registration is open and non-exclusive; no industry or discipline is privileged over another.

1. Mission and purpose. This gTLD will be operated as an open, unrestricted generic top-level domain. Its purpose is to expand naming choice in the DNS by making this term available at the top level for any lawful use chosen by the registrant. Registrations will be available to all registrants on a first-come, first-served basis through ICANN-accredited registrars, subject only to the Registry Agreement, ICANN Consensus Policies, and applicable law. The applicant will not operate this gTLD on an exclusive basis. 2. Intended registrants and users. Intended registrants are individuals, businesses, and other organizations worldwide seeking a short, meaningful domain name. There are no eligibility or name selection restrictions beyond those required by the Registry Agreement, ICANN Consensus Policies, and applicable law. Intended users are internet users worldwide who access domain names registered in this gTLD. 3. Related activities. The applicant is an established registry operator under contract with ICANN for 35 gTLDs, including .xyz. It has in place a qualified Registry Service Provider, distribution agreements with ICANN-accredited registrars across multiple regions, and all required rights protection mechanisms and DNS abuse mitigation practices. For this gTLD the applicant will onboard the TLD to its existing registry platform, conduct a Sunrise Period and Trademark Claims Period, launch General Availability through its registrar channel, and maintain ongoing registrar enablement, abuse monitoring, and compliance reporting. 4. Sustainability. Operation is funded by recurring registration and renewal revenue and does not depend on any single registrant, sector, or campaign. This gTLD will run on the applicant's existing shared registry infrastructure, so incremental operating cost is low and no minimum registration volume is required for viability. The applicant has operated gTLDs continuously since 2014.