Judges are not looking favorably on consumer cases against candy manufacturers who only fill their boxes halfway.
When manufacturers over-package a product creating empty space inside that has no function other than to make consumers think they are getting more for their money than they really are, that is called slack fill, and it’s illegal under federal law (and the law of some states). It is not illegal if the empty space is needed because of settling of the product, or because the machinery to fill the package requires it, or the space is needed to protect the product (such as the cushioning pillow created by large potato chips bags).
A federal court judge just let Tootsie Roll off hook for its five-and-a-half inch high boxes of Junior Mints that are close to half empty inside.
*MOUSE PRINT:
Note that the illustration with a ruler is of a revised box introduced after the lawsuit ended that states on the front the minimum number of mints inside.
In ruling against the consumer who brought the case, the judge said in part in his opinion:
To begin, the Products contain a disclosure that the Products are sold by weight, and not volume, which addresses the very information that Plaintiff alleges was misrepresented.
Furthermore, the net weight of the candy, both in metric and standard measurements, is displayed on the front of the Products’ boxes in easily discernable font.
And citing some other related cases, the judge adopted their conclusions:
“the slack-fill enclosed in [a box of Junior Mints] would not mislead a reasonable consumer†because the Junior Mints’ boxes included the net weight of the candy and consumers have come to expect some slack-fill in certain products…
…a consumer “can easily calculate the number of candies contained in the Product boxes simply by multiplying the serving size by the number of servings in each box, information displayed in the nutritional facts section on the back of each box.â€
What’s troubling is the judge’s reasoning that since the net weight is stated on the package (as all packaged food products are required to) that somehow makes irrelevant that the product is packaged in a box that makes it look like it contains more content than it really does. What is the point of the slack-fill law if over-packaging like this is continued to be allowed?
A regular Consumer World reader from Florida who we’ll call N.W. recently wrote to us about a disturbing discovery when she called the technical support department of Spectrum, her cable provider.
