Posts Tagged ‘ false advertising ’

Must See: Stephen Colbert Explains Vitamin Water Lawsuit!

January 18th, 2013. By AbiK

 

Remember the Coca-Cola Vitamin Water class action lawsuit? Well, it’s still out there—and there was even a copycat class action filed in Canada. But no one can quite shed light on the allegations involved in the Vitamin Water lawsuits quite the way Stephen Colbert can—so if you missed his show on Monday (1/14/13), check out the video above.

For an additional laugh, here’s what’s on Coke’s website—on their “Coca-Cola Journey” section—in response to the initial class action filing. Hard to believe this was written by someone old enough to have working papers. Read on—and no, it’s not a joke—this is really published on the Coke website:

The glacéau vitaminwater lawsuit is a ridiculous and ludicrous lawsuit. glacéau vitaminwater is a great tasting, hydrating beverage with essential vitamins and water, with labels showing calorie content.

Filing a lawsuit is an opportunistic PR stunt. This is not about protecting the public interest. This is about grandstanding at a time when CSPI is receiving very little attention. There is no surprise that one week before the inauguration of the U.S. President, with the flurry of activity in Washington, D.C., that CSPI has chosen today to try to bring attention to themselves.

We don’t need a “healthful” alternative to sodas. All our beverages, including sparkling and diets, can be part of healthful diet. Furthermore, consumers today are aware and are looking for more from their beverages than just hydration. Products like glacéau vitaminwater provide a great tasting choice for hydration that also helps contribute to daily needs for some essential nutrients.

Consumers can readily see the nutrition facts panels on every bottle of glacéau vitaminwater, which show what’s in our product and what’s not. The success of glacéau vitaminwater is due in large part to consumers looking for a product like this to help support their healthy, active and on-the-go lifestyle.

Put simply, glacéau vitaminwater is a great complement to our often less-than-perfect diet with each of the different glacéau vitaminwater varieties providing a convenient, great-tasting way to get more of some of the vitamins and hydration we all need each day.

No joke folks.

 

Tags: Class Action Lawsuit, Coca-Cola, Coke, Consumer Fraud, false advertising, Glaceau, Stephen Colbert, Vitamin Water, VitaminWater
Posted in Class Action, Consumer Fraud, Emerging Issues, lawsuits | 2 Comments »

NY’ers Mad Subway Isn’t Giving Full 12-Inch Footlongs

January 17th, 2013. By AbiK

There’s new meaning to being mad at the subway in NYC—and it’s got nothing to do with platform closures or delays.

No, some folks are mad at Subway—the sub sandwich restaurant chain that’s made “footlong” a part of our lunchtime lexicon. They’re mad because they’ve taken a tape measure to those Subway footlong subs and found (shock!) that in a random test, 4 out of 7 footlongs were, in fact, only 11 or 11.5 inches.

Yes, a NY Post discovery reveals that those footlong subs may be falsely advertised. Usually, such egregious findings have the potential to lead to a consumer fraud class action lawsuit being filed. None has apparently been filed yet—not surprising given New Yorkers’ capacity to roll with the daily barrage of life’s nuisances.

The fraudulent footlong story first became a viral hit when Matt Corby, of Australia, posted a photo measuring his footlong—and it coming up short at 11 inches—on his Facebook page (where else? see image above). According to the Post, the FB post got 118,000 likes in 24 hours. That FB post then led the NY Post to traipse around three boroughs buying footlongs and measuring them—the aforementioned ‘test’.

Now, you may think, “so what?” But the NY Post took things a step further and calculated the impact of missing that 12th inch on a consumer who purchases a footlong every other day for a year, at $7 per footlong. They estimated that short-changing customers that inch of sandwich equates to about a $100 loss. That’s about 44 rides on the real subway!

According to the Post, Les Winogad, a spokesman for Subway, said the photo on Corby’s Facebook page “doesn’t meet our standards.” Newsflash: it doesn’t meet New Yorkers standards either. Or anyone else’s.

Tags: Consumer Fraud, false advertising, Footlong, Subway
Posted in Consumer Fraud, Emerging Issues | No Comments »

UK Watchdog Slams Special K Calorie Count, Bans Ads

July 10th, 2012. By AbiK

You know that Special K Challenge? That’s the one where you eat a Special K breakfast and lunch, and then have a ‘sensible meal’ for dinner—along with whatever fruits and vegetables you want, and the beverages you ‘normally’ have. And you’re supposed to lose weight…and fit into those jeans you’ve long since busted out of.

A twice-a-day Special K diet may help you shed some pounds, but the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) over in the UK has taken issue with some of Kellogg’s Special K advertising. It seems that some of the Special K advertising has promoted the breakfast cereal as adding only  114 calories per serving to a daily diet—why, that’s a meal with just a few teeny calories over a “100-calorie” snack pack!

Surely, you can’t go wrong on your diet with that.

But, the UK ad watchdog has seen something wrong how the calories are counted in the Special K ads: where’s the milk? And that’s led to a false advertising slap on the wrist.

Seems a number of Brits—and, of course, Americans—eat their cereal with milk. And as such, the UK Special K ads showed women preparing their cereal breakfast by pouring milk into it. Those aforementioned 114 calories don’t account for the milk. And if  you add the milk back into the equation, that can boost the calorie count up to anywhere between 200 and 236 calories.

According to a recent report in the Daily Mail (7/4/12), Kellogg’s responded to a complaint the ASA received by stating that the company left out the milk calories because “many customers eat the cereal dry, or with orange juice or yogurt.”

That response, apparently, did not measure up enough for the ASA. The Special K ads have been banned.

Tags: Advertising Standards Authority, Consumer Fraud, false advertising, Kellogg's, Special K, Special K Diet, UK
Posted in Consumer Fraud | 1 Comment »

Oscillo Flu Relief Settlement Preliminary Approval: Here’s What To Do

May 26th, 2012. By AbiK

Remember this one? The Oscillo Flu Relief false advertising class action? Or, for those of you who can pronounce it, the Oscillococcinum class action lawsuit…which basically alleged that a couple of homeopathic ingredients and sugar may not actually do a blessed thing (expect perhaps a placebo effect) on curing or diminishing your flu symptoms.

Well, the class action lawsuit was actually against Boiron and it covered more than Oscillo. Now, it’s got a preliminary approval on its settlement. So here we go with the settlement details…

Am I part of the Oscillo Flu Relief Class Action Settlement?

You are if you purchased Oscillococcinum, Children’s Oscillococcinum, Arnicare, Quietude, Camilia, Coldcalm and ‘other products manufactured by Boiron’ between Jan. 1, 2000 and the present. You’re NOT a part of the class for this settlement if you were a California resident whose only purchase of a Boiron product was of Children’s Coldcalm in California after August 31, 2006.

What do I get as part of the Oscillo Flu Relief Class Action Settlement?

As with all class action settlements, the amount each class member receives will be contingent on how many claimants (ie, class members) submit a claim form. However, class members who file timely and valid claims (see below) are eligible to receive up to $100.00 per household.

For this settlement, a settlement fund of $5 million is being set up to pay claims to eligible Class Members, attorneys’ fees and costs, and the notice and claims administration costs. Boiron (the company that makes Oscillo) is also agreeing to make certain changes to the manner in which it advertises the products involved in the class action lawsuit.

What do I have to do now?

Here are your options to…

Submit a Claim: Do not submit a claim here at LawyersandSettlements.com. You can submit your Oscillo claim form at the claims administrator’s website here: http://www.gilardi.com/boironsettlement/FileClaim.

Otherwise, you will need to send in a completed claim form and, if available, proof of purchase of the applicable Boiron products you’ve purchased to the Claims Administrator (address shown below). Your claim must be postmarked no later than 45 days after the date the Court enters the Judgment.

The Court will hold a hearing on August 13, 2012 at 2:30 p.m. at the federal courthouse at 940 Front Street, Courtroom 11, San Diego, CA 92101, to consider final approval of the Boiron settlement, including payment of reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs to Class Counsel related to obtaining the settlement relief, an incentive award to each of the named Plaintiffs, and related issues.

Object to the Settlement: If you want to object to the Oscillo settlement you have to file a written statement with the Court and serve a copy on Class Counsel, Counsel for Defendants and the Claims Administrator, postmarked by July 14, 2012. Instructions for how to object are explained in the detailed notice at www.gilardi.com/boironsettlement.

Exclude yourself from the Settlement: If you do not want to be bound by the settlement, you must send a letter to the Claims Administrator at the address below requesting to be excluded. The letter must be postmarked by July 14, 2012. If you exclude yourself, you cannot receive a benefit from this settlement, but you can sue the manufacturer of the Products for the claims alleged in this lawsuit. If you do not exclude yourself from the settlement or do nothing, you will be bound by the Court’s decisions.

For more information and to obtain a detailed notice, claim form, list of Products, or other documents, visit www.gilardi.com/boironsettlement or call, toll-free, 877-256-3879, or write to Boiron Claims Administrator, P.O. Box 8060, San Rafael, CA 94912-8060.

Tags: Boiron, Class Action Lawsuit, Consumer Fraud, false advertising, Homeopathic remedy, Oscillo Flu Relief Settlement
Posted in Class Action, Consumer Fraud, Drugs/Medical, Emerging Issues, Settlement | No Comments »

POM Juice Misleads Again with “Doctored” Ads

May 25th, 2012. By AbiK

Unfortunately, advertising isn’t quite held to the same ethical bar that journalism (usually) is. There’s a careful and deliberate selection of each and every word in an ad—and you’re delusional if you think otherwise. But the folks over at POM Wonderful pomegranate juice have taken their selectivity a bit far this week in rolling out an ad campaign that serves as their rebuttal of sorts to the false advertising ruling made by Judge D. Michael Chappell.

Judge Chappell’s ruling was in response to an FTC complaint regarding the alleged health claims that POM was making about the popular juice. The bottom line? POM was found to have insufficient evidence to support its claims that its pomegranate juice reduced the risk of heart disease—as well as prostate cancer (and even impotence—gee, maybe they should’ve teamed up with Merck to help Propecia victims overcome ED while they were at it). The judge also issued a cease-and-desist order that forbids POM from making such claims for 20 years.

So what does POM do? In true catfight fashion, they stoop to childlike tactics and run some ads that use pull-quotes from the judge’s ruling—out of context. For example, one ad states (from the ruling) that, “Competent and reliable scientific evidence supports the conclusion that the consumption of pomegranate juice and pomegranate extract supports prostate health, including by prolonging PSA doubling time in men with rising PSA after primary treatment for prostate cancer”

But it cuts off there without the following statement: “However, the greater weight of the persuasive expert testimony shows that the evidence relied upon by the respondents is not adequate to substantiate claims that POM products treat, prevent or reduce the risk of prostate cancer or that they are clinically proven to do so.”

It’s an interesting ‘rebuttal’ as, without clinical studies supporting the health claims—studies that would stand up in a court of law, that is—the ads POM is running could actually backfire; after all, rather than just go quietly and not draw further attention to the ruling, now the media will be all over the ads (as we are). And without the ‘scientific proof’ it certainly starts to become transparent that this may well be more about sales and revenue impact than any grand gesture to promote the curative benefits of some medicinal elixir.

Well, as they say, you be the judge—and let us know what you think.

Tags: Consumer Fraud, false advertising, FTC, Judge D Michael Chappell, POM pomegranate juice, POM Wonderful
Posted in Complaints/Comments, Consumer Fraud, Emerging Issues, lawsuits, Personal Injury | No Comments »