Challenge to Jim Beam® “Handcrafted” Label Dismissed

A California federal court has dismissed a putative class action alleging
that Jim Beam Brands and Beam Suntory Import mislabel Jim Beam®
bourbon bottles because the label calls the product “handcrafted” despite
its machine-based manufacturing process. Welk v. Beam Suntory Imp.
Co., No. 15-0328 (S.D. Cal., order entered August 21, 2015). The plaintiff
had alleged that a reasonable consumer would be fooled by the bourbon
label because the production process for the “handmade” product
requires “little to no human supervision, assistance or involvement.”
Details about the complaint appear in Issue 556 of this Update.

The court first denied the distillery’s motion to dismiss under California’s
safe harbor doctrine, finding that although Jim Beam could prove the
Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau had approved the label, the
evidence did not indicate whether the agency investigated and approved
including decisions finding for Jim Beam and its sibling brand Maker’s
Mark®, and concluded that the precedents were persuasive. “A reasonable
consumer wouldn’t interpret the word ‘handcrafted’ on a bourbon bottle
to mean that the product is literally ‘created by a hand process rather
than by a machine.’ Thus, it isn’t ‘reasonably interpreted as a statement
of objective fact.’” Accordingly, the court granted Jim Beam’s motion
to dismiss. Additional information about the Maker’s Mark® dismissal
appears in Issue 564 of this Update.