Beaudry v. The NOCO Company, Inc.

Background

Peter Beaudry purchased a NOCO GB150 jump starter through Amazon. He alleged that, when his boat battery died, the product failed to jump-start it, while a friend’s jump starter succeeded. He alleged that NOCO advertised its products as “easy-to-use,” “mistake-proof,” and able to “start dead batteries.”

Beaudry asserted claims for breach of implied warranties under the California Commercial Code and California’s Song-Beverly Consumer Warranty Act, plus claims under California’s False Advertising Law and Unfair Competition Law. He also brought claims on behalf of a proposed class. NOCO moved to dismiss, and separately moved to stay discovery while the dismissal motion was pending.

Requests for Judicial Notice

The court considered the Amazon GB40 product webpage and two product reviews because the complaint referred extensively to them or quoted from them. It declined to consider the Amazon GB150 webpage, other reviews, and screenshots of Amazon artificial-intelligence reports. The court also denied NOCO’s request to take judicial notice of the product user guide.

Rulings on the Claims

The court dismissed with prejudice Beaudry’s California Commercial Code claims for implied warranty of merchantability and implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose. Beaudry did not oppose dismissal of those claims, and the court held that he had not alleged the required contractual relationship with NOCO.

The court denied dismissal of the Song-Beverly implied-warranty-of-merchantability claim. It rejected NOCO’s reliance on positive consumer reviews because the court had declined to consider some of those materials and because resolving factual disputes is improper at the motion-to-dismiss stage.

The court dismissed with leave to amend Beaudry’s Song-Beverly implied-warranty-of-fitness-for-a-particular-purpose claim. The court found that the complaint did not clearly identify a particular purpose different from the ordinary purpose of using the products as jump starters.

The court dismissed Beaudry’s False Advertising Law claim without prejudice. It held that the complaint did not adequately allege that NOCO made the statements on the Amazon webpage on which Beaudry relied. The court also stated that “easy to use” and “mistake-proof” were nonactionable general praise, while the statement that the products could “start dead batteries” was not puffery and could support a false-advertising claim if adequately pleaded.

The court denied dismissal of the Unfair Competition Law claim’s unlawful portion because it was based on the surviving Song-Beverly merchantability claim. The court dismissed without prejudice the claim’s fraudulent portion because it depended on the dismissed false-advertising claim and did not satisfy the heightened pleading requirement for fraud.

Class Allegations and Discovery

The court denied NOCO’s motion to dismiss Beaudry’s class allegations. It held that a motion to dismiss generally is not the proper way to challenge class claims and that NOCO had not shown this was the rare case in which the class requirements could not possibly be met.

The court denied NOCO’s motion to stay discovery. The order’s introduction describes that motion as denied as moot, while the conclusion states that it was denied.

Disposition

The court granted NOCO’s motion to dismiss in part and denied it in part. It dismissed the California Commercial Code warranty claims with prejudice; dismissed without prejudice the False Advertising Law claim and the Unfair Competition Law claim’s fraudulent portion; dismissed with leave to amend the Song-Beverly fitness-for-a-particular-purpose claim; and denied the motion as to the Song-Beverly merchantability claim, the Unfair Competition Law claim’s unlawful portion, and the class allegations. The court granted leave to amend solely to cure the deficiencies identified in the order, with any amended complaint due within 28 days.