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Buffalo Wild Wings can maintain calling its menu merchandise “boneless wings” as such, a federal choose dominated Tuesday, dismissing a lawsuit that claimed the title amounted to false promoting.
U.S. District Choose John Tharp in Illinois issued a 10-page ruling permitting the sports activities bar chain to proceed calling its menu merchandise “boneless wings,” after a Chicago man filed a lawsuit accusing the restaurant of false promoting, saying the boneless wings had been overpriced as a result of they’re primarily hen nuggets.
Whereas Aimen Halim argued within the lawsuit that Buffalo Wild Wings ought to name the product one thing totally different, like “hen poppers,” Tharp mentioned the argument had no meat on its bones.
“Halim didn’t ‘drum’ up sufficient factual allegations to state a declare,” Tharp wrote. “Although he has standing to convey the declare as a result of he plausibly alleged financial harm, he doesn’t plausibly allege that affordable shoppers are fooled by BWW’s use of the time period ‘boneless wings.'”
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A federal choose dominated that Buffalo Wild Wings can proceed utilizing the time period “boneless wings” after dismissing a lawsuit that claimed the title was deceptive. (Tiffany Hagler-Geard/Bloomberg by way of Getty Pictures / Getty Pictures)
Halim sued Buffalo Wild Wings shortly after he visited the restaurant in January 2023, claiming he was deceived by the chain’s advertising and marketing.
Halim alleged that the boneless wings are simply “slices of hen breast meat deep-fried like wings,” and that prospects would both pay much less for the boneless wings or not buy them in any respect in the event that they knew what was within the product.
Halim mentioned he later regretted shopping for the merchandise after studying the way it was made, which he claimed induced him to undergo “a monetary harm because of defendants’ false and misleading conduct.”
In his ruling, Tharp mentioned that whereas boneless wings are “primarily hen nuggets,” the product idea was not new, noting that Buffalo Wild Wings had bought them since 2003.
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A federal choose dominated that Buffalo Wild Wings’ boneless wings usually are not misleading, dismissing a lawsuit over the menu merchandise’s title. (iStock / iStock)
“Boneless wings usually are not a distinct segment product for which a shopper would wish to do intensive analysis to determine the reality,” he wrote. “As a substitute, ‘boneless wings’ is a typical time period that has existed for over twenty years.”
Halim accused Buffalo Wild Wings of violating the Illinois Shopper Fraud Act, breach of categorical guarantee, frequent regulation fraud and unjust enrichment.
Tharp additionally cited an Ohio Supreme Courtroom ruling from 2024, the place the courtroom dominated that “[a] diner studying ‘boneless wings’ on a menu would no extra consider that the restaurant was warranting the absence of bones within the gadgets than consider that the gadgets had been made out of hen wings, simply as an individual consuming ‘hen fingers’ would know that he had not been served fingers.”
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A choose rejected claims that Buffalo Wild Wings’ boneless wings labeling deceives prospects. (Getty / Getty Pictures)
Tharp added {that a} “affordable shopper” wouldn’t suppose that the meals chain’s boneless wings had been “actually deboned hen wings, reconstituted into some type of Franken-wing.”
The courtroom is permitting Halim to submit an amended grievance by March 20, though Tharp famous that it “is tough to think about” that he can present extra information that may show that Buffalo Wild Wings “is committing a misleading act.”
FOX Enterprise’ Landon Mion contributed to this report.
