Del Monte Foods sells packaged fruit cups that have the phrase “fruit naturals” on them.  A consumer sued, alleging that the use the word “naturals” is misleading, since it falsely suggests that all of the ingredients in the fruit cups are, in fact, natural.

A federal district court dismissed the case.  On appeal, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the dismissal.  Here's why.

Looking at the label, the Ninth Circuit held that the word “naturals” is ambiguous.  In the Ninth Circuit, a claim on the front of a label is ambiguous if “reasonable consumers would necessarily require more information before they could reasonably conclude that the front label makes a specific factual representation.” 

Why does the Ninth Circuit think that the word “naturals” is ambiguous on the front of a fruit cup?   First, the word "naturals" is used as a noun, not an adjective.  That, along with the fact that the “fruit naturals” phrase has a registered trademark symbol after it, led the Ninth Circuit to believe that consumers will understand this just to be the name of the product, not a specific factual claim about how the product was made.  Second, the Ninth Circuit thought that the use of the phrase “in extra light syrup” on the packaging, which shows a picture of the fruit that's in the syrup, could convey that although the fruit was natural, the syrup is not. 

What's the significance of the Ninth Circuit's holding that the term “naturals” is ambiguous?   Because the plaintiff failed to plausibly allege that the front label is “unambiguously deceptive to an ordinary consumer," this means that reasonable consumers (at least in the Ninth Circuit) would look to the back label to clear up any confusion about what the term means.  And, here, “the back label accurately and clearly discloses several synthetic ingredients about which Plaintiff complains.” 

Bryan v. Del Monte Foods (9th Circuit, November 22, 2024).