A woman sued a jelly bean maker after being left surprised at how much sugar the sweets contained.
Jessica Gomez took out a lawsuit against Jelly Belly after she ate the company’s Sport Beans in 2017.
The product was marketed as containing “electrolytes and vitamins.”
Gomez argued she was misled over the sugar content, which she found was more than she thought.
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She claimed the company’s use of the term “evaporated cane juice” in its ingredients list was misleading.
The suit said this was a deceptive synonym for sugar aimed at misleading the health-conscious people who buy the product.
Jelly Belly called the case “nonsense” and said if she’d spotted the ingredient in the list, she would have also seen the nutritional information on the packet.
The suit charged Jelly Belly with “negligent misrepresentation and breaches of California’s Consumer Legal Remedies Act, False Advertising Law, and Unfair Business Practices Law.”
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In its response, Jelly Belly said:
“This is nonsense.
“No reasonable consumer could have been deceived by Sport Beans’ labeling – Gomez could not have seen ‘evaporated cane juice’ without also seeing the product’s sugar content on its Nutrition Facts panel.”
The court sided with Jelly Belly.
A judge dismissed the case when Gomez was unable to show any facts specific to the purchase or that relied on the advertising of the product.
