Nielsen Consumer LLC v. Circana Group, L.P.

Background

Nielsen Consumer LLC, referred to in the opinion as NielsenIQ, sued Circana Group, L.P. over an agreement concerning ReceiptPal, a mobile application that collects information about users’ purchases through receipts. During the lawsuit, the parties disputed Circana’s marketing of a similar application, CoinOut, to ReceiptPal panelists.

On January 22, 2024, the court approved a stipulation and order providing that, while the lawsuit was pending, Circana would not market CoinOut—or support another entity’s marketing of CoinOut—directly to ReceiptPal panelists, including through email promotion or advertising on the ReceiptPal application.

On March 26 and April 15, 2025, about 68,000 ReceiptPal panelists received emails from CoinOut. The emails reminded recipients about submitting receipts, completing monthly challenges, earning rewards, and maintaining or increasing their status. Circana investigated and concluded that the emails, which were intended for CoinOut users, reached some ReceiptPal panelists because of two separate, inadvertent human errors in the platform used to communicate with CoinOut and ReceiptPal panelists.

NielsenIQ’s Motion

NielsenIQ argued that the two emails violated the stipulation and order and moved to hold Circana in civil contempt. Civil contempt is a court finding that a party violated a court order; the court explained that the moving party must prove by clear and convincing evidence that the order was clear and unambiguous, that the violation occurred, and that the alleged violator did not make a reasonable and diligent effort to comply.

Court’s Analysis

The court concluded that civil contempt sanctions were not warranted for two independent reasons.

First, the court found ambiguity in the order. The order prohibited marketing CoinOut directly to ReceiptPal panelists, including by email promotion. The court said the order could reasonably be read as prohibiting emails that promoted CoinOut or sought to recruit recipients to the application. Because the March and April emails were intended to remind existing CoinOut users to upload receipts, the court found that the emails did not clearly fall within the order’s prohibition. The court therefore found a fair ground to doubt that Circana’s conduct was wrongful.

Second, the court held that NielsenIQ had not shown that Circana failed to act diligently. Circana gave an undisputed explanation that two separate instances of human error caused the emails to be sent to ReceiptPal panelists. Circana also described steps it took to comply, including rerouting links in earlier marketing emails, deactivating and removing campaigns from a third-party interface, issuing an internal compliance directive, and prohibiting communications to ReceiptPal users that mentioned CoinOut. The court found these actions showed a good-faith and reasonable effort to comply. It also noted that Circana changed its measures after learning they had not fully prevented the problem.

The court further stated that the emails were inadvertent and that Circana’s lack of willfulness weighed against a contempt finding. Willfulness was not required to establish contempt, but the court could consider the technical or inadvertent nature of the alleged violations.

Disposition

The court DENIED NielsenIQ’s motion for contempt.