Blue Moon Beer

June 2016: After plaintiffs filed an amended complaint making similar allegations (i. e., the company misleadingly markets Blue Moon as a craft beer when it is not) in November 2015, a federal judge dismissed this action When a complaint is dismissed with prejudice, it cannot be refiled. finding that, among other things, representations in the advertisements amount to puffery and a reasonable consumer could not rely on them.

October 2015: A federal judge dismissed the case When a complaint is dismissed without prejudice, an amended version of the complaint can be refiled.. Among other things, the judge concluded that plaintiffs did not adequately plead that reasonable consumers could be misled into believing that Blue Moon is an independently brewed, hand-crafted beer not owned by MillerCoors. The judge went on to state that it is difficult to see how the term “artfully crafted” can be “reasonably interpreted” as a statement about the method of production.

2015: A false advertising class-action lawsuit was filed against MillerCoors LLC. Among other things, the complaint alleges that the company misleadingly represents that Blue Moon beer is independently brewed, hand-crafted beer that is brewed in a small, limited capacity brewery when, according to plaintiffs, it is not craft beer and it is brewed in the MillerCoors breweries where all of the company’s other beers are brewed. (The lawsuit was originally filed in April 2015 and transferred to federal court in May.) (Parent et al v. MillerCoors LLC and Does 1-50, Case No. 15-cv-1204, S. D. CA.)

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