False Advertising

Activia yogurt

Dannon's popular Activia brand yogurt lured consumers into paying more for its purported nutritional benefits -- when it was actually pretty much the same as every other kind of yogurt.
Falsely touting the "clinically" and "scientifically" proven nutritional benefits of the product, Dannon even got a famous spokesperson, Jamie Lee Curtis, for the supposed digestion-regulator. But after a while, some customers didn't buy it.
A class action settlement last year forced Dannon to pay up to $45 million in damages to the consumers that filed the lawsuit and others who said they'd been bamboozled. The company also had to limit its health claims on its products strictly to factual ones.
Source: ABC News

Splenda

The Sugar Association says Splenda's "Made from Sugar" slogan is misleading, and that the sweetner is nothing more than "highly processed chemical compound made in a factory," reports CBS
In 2008, the association first filed a suit against Johnson & Johnson subsidiary McNeil Nutritionals, which then countersued the association engaging in a "malicious smear campaign." The two parties reached a confidential settlement before going to trial.
Equal also took its rival to court in 2007, accusing "the makers of Splenda of confusing consumers into thinking its product was healthier and more natural than other artificial sweeteners." The two parties also reached a confidential settlement.  



Eclipse gum

Eclipse gum claimed that its new ingredient, magnolia bark extract, had germ-killing properties. Businessweek reports:
Consumers sued Wrigley [in 2009] in federal court arguing the subsidiary of privately held Mars Inc. made misleading advertising claims about the germ-killing properties of Eclipse.
As part of the settlement, Wrigley will change how it markets and labels its gum. It agreed to pay $6 million to $7 million to a fund that will reimburse consumers up to $10 each for the product and cover other costs of the settlement, according to the law firms Blood Hurst & O'Reardon and Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd.

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