Santa Clara, CA: A consumer fraud class action lawsuit has been filed against the Vitamin Shoppe Inc., alleging it falsely advertised the company’s Garcinia Cambogia Extract dietary supplement.
Specifically, the lawsuit, filed by named plaintiff Andrea Nathan, states that Vitamin Shoppe’s Garcinia Cambogia Extract dietary supplement claims to facilitate ''weight management" and "appetite control," but its only active ingredients, hydroxycitric acid and chromium, “are scientifically proven to be incapable of providing such weight-loss benefits.”
Filed in federal court in California, the lawsuit contends “Defendant markets and advertises the product as an effective weight-loss supplement through claims placed directly on the bottle product despite that it provides no such benefits. ”
Nathan alleges that, based on the weight loss claims, she paid about $20 for a 180-caplet bottle of the Garcinia Cambogia Extract. However, instead of purchasing a weight loss aid, she and others similarly situated actually bought a product that is “no more effective than a placebo.”
Consequently, Nathan claims, she lost money due to the company’s misrepresentations, because she paid more than she would have for similar products that did not make weight loss claims.
“The senior officers and directors of defendant allowed the product to be sold with full knowledge or reckless disregard that the challenged claims are fraudulent, unlawful, and misleading,” according to the complaint.
Nathan is seeking to represent a class of people who have bought Vitamin Shoppe's Garcinia Cambogia since June 26, 2013.
The suit claims violations of California’s Unfair Competition Law, False Advertising Law and Consumer Legal Remedies Act, as well as breach of warranties.
Nathan is represented by Paul K. Joseph of The Law Office of Paul K. Joseph PC.
The lawsuit is Andrea Nathan v. Vitamin Shoppe Inc., case number 3:17-cv-01590 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.
