The company has been making legal headlines of late for taking Australian retailer Target to court over the alleged sale of fake MAC cosmetics where the retailer has been attempting to make a settlement offer ever since.
Estée Lauder is now the one up for questioning after Donna Tomasino of New York filed a consumer fraud class action lawsuit, alleging the brand had practiced misleading advertising with its serum by suggesting it promotes DNA repair and other anti-aging effects.
According to legal blog, Lawyersandsettlements.com, Tomasino purchased the Night and Eye Repair serums specifically because of claims made by the company’s, only to find that there is no product testing to back up the alleged anti-aging claims.
Now the one in hot water...
The class action states; “The clinical studies and other data that Estee Lauder represents as supportive of the claimed efficacy results are nothing more than a continuation of defendants’ misleading practices."
It went on to say that; "each of the studies is designed to be used in the marketing materials to support the claimed efficacy and defendants know that consumers will not see the results these studies purportedly represent."
Tomasino also alleges Estee Lauder created the claims in its advertising campaign for the Advanced Night Repair products even though the brand knows the advertising claims are false.
And furthermore, that because EL is allegedly motivated by profit, "it deliberately misleads its customers into believing that the products have anti-aging effects so that they will spend a higher price for the Advanced Night Repair line of products."
In sum, Estee Lauder dupes consumers with false and misleading promises of product results based on purported scientific discoveries that it knows it cannot deliver. Estee Lauder does so with one goal in mind, reaping enormous profits at the expense of consumers.
The case remains on-going and EL representatives were unavailable for comment at the time of publishing.