Second Circuit Uphold Terms of Unambiguous Ballpark Vending Contract

In a nonprecedential summary order, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed a lower court ruling against Kosher Sports, Inc., a New Jersey-based provider of kosher food products, which had a 10-year contract with Queens Ballpark Co., the company that operates Citi Field, where the New York Mets play their home games. Kosher Sports, Inc. v. Queens Ballpark Co., LLC, No. 12-2162 (2d Cir., decided March 12, 2013). Kosher Sports claimed that the operating company breached the agreement by refusing to allow it to sell Glatt Kosher hot dogs and sausages and other products on Friday nights and Saturdays. It also claimed that Queens Ballpark failed to provide a suitable location for the company’s fourth cart to sell its products at the stadium. The court found that the unambiguous terms of the contract simply “set forth [Kosher Sports’] ‘rights’ to advertising space, tickets, and freedom from competition” but did not “address the right to sell at any particular time or place.” The contract also apparently failed “to provide [Kosher Sports] with a right to place four carts at mutually approved locations.” An unsigned email between the companies about cart location was insufficient, in the court’s view, to alter the contract’s terms.