Here we go again. A lawsuit, originally filed in 2017 (but recently amended) against Poland Spring maker Nestle has been given the green light to proceed by a federal court.
Plaintiffs allege in a 325-page complaint that Poland Spring water is not “100% natural spring water” as the label claims because it doesn’t really come from a natural spring. Rather, they say, it is groundwater that comes from a series of man-made springs. They contend the original Poland Spring in Maine ran dry in the 1970s.
For its part, Nestle says that Poland Spring water comes from eight different springs in Maine that meet the FDA’s definition of “spring water.”
…water derived from an underground formation from which water flows naturally to the surface of the earth may be “spring water.” Spring water shall be collected only at the spring [with] a natural force causing the water to flow to the surface through a natural orifice. –FDA regulations
Their website seems to protesteth a little too much for an innocent company by providing detailed information about the source of their water, including a map.
The judge in the case wasn’t buying some of the company’s arguments. For example, lawyers for Nestle asserted with a straight face in a prior hearing that the result of a previous lawsuit about the true source of Poland Spring water put the current plaintiffs on notice that the company’s claims might be false (and thus they can’t now contend that they were duped). This argument ranks right up there with a standard legal defense used by company lawyers in false advertising cases — “No reasonable consumer would believe the outrageous claims made in our advertising.”
So, it will be up to a court to decide whether the billions of dollars consumers have spent for Poland Spring water over the years was based on a false premise.
Hat tip to TruthinAdvertising.org for the lawsuit link.
Spoiler Alert: It doesn’t come from Poland either