Starbucks Is Being Sued for Deceiving Customers

Starbucks may be making some people happy with the return of the Pumpkin Spice Latte and free drinks available throughout September, but not everyone is pleased with the brand. In fact, there’s enough displeasure to warrant a class action lawsuit.

Why Is Starbucks Getting Sued? 

The lawsuit is in regard to the brand’s Refreshers beverages, fruit-flavored beverages with green coffee extract for a caffeinated boost. The main claim in the lawsuit is that the Refreshers beverages don’t actually contain some of the fruit referenced in the different flavor names. Specifically, the Strawberry Açaí Refresher contains no açaí, the Pineapple Passionfruit Refresher contains no passionfruit, and the Mango Dragonfruit Refresher contains no mango. (Starbucks does use freeze-dried strawberries, pineapple, and dragonfruit in the aforementioned refreshers, though.) 

The complaint is that customers were led to believe that the beverages contained the fruit mentioned in the product name and were charged a premium for it. According to the original lawsuit, “Had [Plaintiff Joan Kominis] and other consumers been aware that the Products are missing one of the named fruits, they would not have purchased the Products or would have paid significantly less for them. Accordingly, Plaintiff and Class members have been injured by Defendant’s deceptive business practices.”

The lawsuit was filed last August, and Starbucks attempted to have it dismissed, saying that "no reasonable consumer would be misled by the products’ names into thinking that the products contain the missing fruit." However, the federal judge rejected the brand’s request for dismissal based on the notion that a “significant portion” of the public could be misled by the names.

The original lawsuit says that the Refreshers are particularly deceitful because Starbucks product names are generally descriptive of their contents, meaning when you order a Matcha Tea Latte, you know it contains matcha.

Starbucks isn’t the only brand in legal hot water with consumers, recently. Aldi is being sued for misleading labels on packaged fruit and grain bars leading customers to believe the bars were naturally flavored, and Taco Bell is facing a lawsuit for overselling the size of its products in photos. In this case, the class action lawsuit is demanding a trial by jury to determine what a reasonable consumer actually thinks.