A Florida woman has decided to sue the Kraft Heinz Company to the tune of $5 million. She’s claiming the instructions on packaging of microwavable mac and cheese cups containing Velveeta cheese is deceptive. The product’s marketing and instructions state the item is “ready in 3½ minutes,” which Amanda Ramirez alleges is not the case.
A West Palm Beach-based law firm filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for he Southern District of Florida on November 18th. The lawsuit describes the preparation and cooking instructions, which reads as follows:
- “First, consumers must ‘REMOVE lid and Cheese Sauce Pouch.’
- Next, they must ‘ADD water to fill line in cup. STIR.’
- Third, ‘MICROWAVE, uncovered, on HIGH 3-1/2 min. DO NOT DRAIN.’
- Finally, they should ‘STIR IN contents of cheese sauce pouch.’
- Defendant then notes that ‘CHEESE SAUCE WILL THICKEN UPON STANDING’.”
The apparent argument is consumers, seeing the “ready in 3½ minutes” claim, are being “terribly misled.” The suit doesn’t actually go into details about HOW consumers are being misled. Or what exactly Ramirez’s grounds are for said lawsuit, other than the “misleading” claim.
If you’re in a hurry, and have exactly the three and a half minutes to make something (and eat it), you’ll be disappointed in this product, we guess? You wouldn’t eat the mac and cheese directly out of the microwave, right? Heinz is lucky she didn’t actually do that and sue for damages from a burnt mouth. But either way you look at it, this is a pretty frivolous lawsuit.
Ramirez is said to have bought this mac and cheese variation on multiple occasions, at a “premium price” of $10.99. That price is most likely for the 12 pack of cups considering the 8 pack goes for about $8-9. We’re also not sure what relevance that has to the case, but, here we are. The plaintiffs are looking for at least $5 million in damages, including statutory and punitive exclusive of interest and costs.
“We are aware of this frivolous lawsuit and will strongly defend against the allegations in the complaint,” Heinz said.
