Brand Lies: Nutella pays $3million for misleading advertising

Fer­rero mar­keted their iconic ‘Nutella’ brand world­wide as “an exam­ple of a tasty yet bal­anced break­fast” when com­bined with milk, orange juice and whole­wheat bread.

The claim from a Cal­i­forn­ian mother, and sup­ported by a class action, was that the adver­tis­ing made them believe the prod­uct was healthy.

Last week, the case was set­tled in favour of con­sumers with reports claim­ing they now share in about $US3 mil­lion as compensation.

Forbes cyn­i­cally reported “$3 Mil­lion for Amer­i­cans too stu­pid to know Nutella is not the health­i­est break­fast”.

On one hand, it does seem to be yet another friv­o­lous claim. Com­mon sense should pre­vail. The ingre­di­ents and nutri­tional infor­ma­tion are clearly printed on the label.

How­ever, it is another exam­ple of how adver­tis­ing can actu­ally dam­age the brand. Dis­re­gard­ing the brand’s equity for short-term think­ing and achieve pub­lic­ity for all the wrong reasons.

Can this suit ever get resolved in a Nigerian court?