Ruiz v. GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare Holdings LLC

Background

Defendant GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare Holdings (US) LLC manufactures and sells Emergen-C dietary supplement products in seven flavors. Plaintiffs Jimy Ruiz and Allan Wong alleged that the products’ packaging—including the phrases “Flavored Fizzy Drink Mix With Natural Flavors,” “Natural Fruit Flavors,” and “Naturally, It’s Good For You,” along with pictures of fresh fruit and other design elements—created the impression that the products contained only natural flavors.

Plaintiffs alleged that the products contain malic acid used as a flavoring and that the form used is artificial. They also alleged that the labels omitted disclosures required for artificial flavors. Their Second Amended Complaint asserted three claims: violation of the California Consumer Legal Remedies Act, unjust enrichment under California law, and breach of express warranty under California law. The defendant moved to dismiss all three claims under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), which permits dismissal when a complaint does not state a legally sufficient claim.

Court’s Analysis

For the Consumer Legal Remedies Act claim, the court applied the reasonable-consumer test. At the pleading stage, plaintiffs had to allege facts making it plausible that a significant portion of reasonable consumers would likely be misled by the labels.

The court relied on its prior rulings in this case and again concluded that the references to “natural,” the fruit images, and related packaging did not plausibly lead reasonable consumers to believe that the products contained exclusively natural flavors. The court also rejected plaintiffs’ reliance on consumer surveys because, as described in the Second Amended Complaint, the surveys did not concern the phrases used on the products’ labels and did not cure the facial problems with the deception claim.

The plaintiffs separately argued that omitting the words “artificially flavored,” contrary to a federal regulation, was likely to mislead reasonable consumers. The court had previously given plaintiffs an opportunity to add facts showing that reasonable consumers knew about the disclosure requirement or had become accustomed to seeing those words whenever a product contained artificial flavors. The court found that the amended allegations were conclusory and lacked supporting facts.

The unjust-enrichment and express-warranty claims were based on the same alleged misrepresentations about the products’ flavoring. Because plaintiffs had not adequately alleged an actionable representation about flavoring, the court held that those claims were also subject to dismissal.

Disposition

The court stated that it had twice allowed plaintiffs to amend the complaint to correct these deficiencies and that further amendment appeared futile. It therefore granted the defendant’s motion to dismiss, dismissed the Second Amended Complaint, and did so without further leave to amend. Judge Maxine M. Chesney signed the order.