Facts

Sarah Salazar filed a class action against Honest Tea Inc. for its alleged dishonesty.

PLAINTIFF'S CONTENTIONS:
Plaintiff alleged that she purchased Honey Green Tea in reliance to the label's representations that the product contained 247 mg of antioxidants. Plaintiffs alleged that the product did not contain the amount of antioxidants as the product's label claimed. Rather, tests revealed that it only contained an amount equivalent to 24 percent below the claimed antioxidants highlighted in the label.

Plaintiff sued Honest Tea for breach of express warranty, breach of implied warranty of merchantability, breach of implied warranty for a particular purpose, violation of California's Consumer Legal Remedies Act, violation of California's Unfair Competition Law, violation of California's False Advertising Law, negligent misrepresentation, and fraud. In addition to Honest Tea's misrepresentations about the antioxidant levels on its green tea products, Salazar also asserted claims based on Honest Tea's honesty-related statements.

DEFENDANT'S CONTENTIONS:
Honest Tea sought to dismiss Salazar's claim on several grounds. Honest Tea contended that Salazar's claims were expressly preempted by the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. In addition, Honest Tea claimed that Salazar's claims should be dismissed because she failed to plead reliance and injury, which were necessary to establish standing. Moreover, it argued that her claims concerning puffery should be dismissed because they were non-actionable, and that her implied warranty claims were also not viable.

Result

The district court granted Honest Tea's motion to dismiss without prejudice on Salazar's claims based on the alleged misrepresentations about the antioxidant level of Honey Green tea due to preemption. The court also granted with prejudice Honest Tea's motion to dismiss Salazar's claims to the extent that they were based on honey-related statements, and denied the motion to the extent that they were based on honesty-related statements. The court dismissed Salazar's state law claims, with leave to amend, because of preemption, but denied the motion as to Honest Tea's honey-related statements.