Bryant v. Buffalo Exchange, LTD.

Background

The plaintiffs alleged that Buffalo Exchange violated section 191(1)(a) of the New York Labor Law by paying them biweekly rather than weekly. That provision requires a “manual worker” to be paid weekly and no later than seven calendar days after the end of the week in which the wages were earned. The plaintiffs sought to represent a class of current and former retail employees at Buffalo Exchange’s five New York locations.

The named plaintiffs held different jobs. Delaney Bryant and Brianna Lemmon worked as buyers, while Violet Ospina worked as a cashier. Buffalo Exchange also employed floor assistants and floor security assistants. Buyers worked at the buy counter and the cash register; cashiers worked at the register but not the buy counter; and floor assistants and floor security assistants did neither.

Class-certification standards

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23, a proposed class must satisfy requirements including numerosity, commonality, typicality, and adequate representation. The plaintiffs also had to show that common issues predominated over individual issues and that a class action was the superior way to resolve the dispute. The plaintiffs bore the burden of proving those requirements by a preponderance of the evidence.

Court’s analysis

The court concluded that numerosity was satisfied. Buffalo Exchange’s payroll information showed approximately 1,144 retail employees in its New York locations, and Buffalo Exchange did not dispute that the class was sufficiently large.

The court focused on commonality and predominance. The plaintiffs identified one central question: whether the retail employees were “manual workers” under New York law. The court explained that this inquiry generally requires employees to spend more than 25% of their working time performing physical labor. Because all potential class members were paid biweekly, the legality of the pay schedule would depend on whether the employees met that definition.

The court held that the plaintiffs had not shown that this question could be answered for the entire proposed class using common evidence. The proposed class covered different job categories with different primary duties. Although all employees performed some shared tasks—such as cleaning, organizing merchandise, checking dressing rooms, and distributing merchandise—the evidence did not establish that every employee was required to spend at least 25% of working time on those tasks.

The court also found that managers exercised discretion in assigning duties. Some buyers could spend most of their shifts at the buy counter or register, and some cashiers could spend six hours or more per shift at the register. Employees assigned to cashier or “in charge” duties could spend little time cleaning. The court therefore determined that the amount of time spent on qualifying physical labor varied by employee, store, job, and managerial assignment.

The plaintiffs relied on employee declarations, testimony, company documents, the employee handbook, training materials, and job descriptions. The court found that the declarations from four former cashiers and buyers were limited because they involved one store, were several years old, and did not establish a companywide practice. The court also found that the company documents showed that employees performed some shared physical tasks but did not show how much time each employee spent on them. One former manager’s contrary declaration was outweighed by declarations from nine current and former managers describing variation among stores and assignments.

The court distinguished cases in which employees had substantially similar duties or spent most of their time on the same work. Here, the court said, some employees never performed duties that others performed regularly, and those differences mattered because the manual-worker inquiry required a quantitative assessment of time spent on particular tasks. A trial would therefore be dominated by individualized inquiries rather than common proof.

Because commonality and predominance were not satisfied, the court did not address typicality, adequacy of representation, or superiority.

Disposition

The court denied the plaintiffs’ motion to certify the proposed class without prejudice. The court stated that the plaintiffs could submit a motion concerning a subclass of retail employees across locations or at a particular store by October 24, 2025. The court did not decide the underlying question whether Buffalo Exchange’s pay practices violated the New York Labor Law.