BELLEVILLE — A class action was filed against Jimmy John's alleging the restaurant's oatmeal raisin cookies are falsely labeled as "all natural."
Heather Erwin and Ashley Price, individually and on behalf of all other similarly situated, filed a complaint Oct. 1 in the St. Clair County Circuit Court against Jimmy John's LLC and Jimmy John's Franchise LLC, alleging breach of express warranty, unjust enrichment, and violation of the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act (ICFA).
According to the complaint, the plaintiffs allege that the defendants' oatmeal raisin cookie being marketed as "all natural" is deceptive. The plaintiffs claim the Jimmy John's cookies labeled as "minimally processed, no artificial ingredients," is deceiving to consumers because the product contains highly processed and artificial ingredients, such as refined flower, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid, sugar, milk powder, soy lecithin and baking soda.
The plaintiffs also claim the alleged false labeling and packing of the cookies "entice consumers" to pay extra for what they believe are "all natural" cookies when the product is actually "worth less than they were represented to be." They allege that if they "had known the cookies in fact contained highly processed, artificial, and/or non-natural ingredients," they would not have purchased them, or they would have paid less than $1.75 per cookie.
The plaintiffs seek compensation, interest and all other just relief. They are represented by David Nelson of Nelson & Nelson, Attorneys At Law PC in Belleville, Matthew Armstrong of The Armstrong Law Firm LLC in St. Louis, and R. John Azimi of The Azimi Law Firm LLC in Independence, Mo.
St. Clair County Circuit Court case number 20-L-0759