Lidl owes French rival $50 mn after ads ruled deceptive

A French tribunal recovered implicit 370 ads ran by Lidl were deceptive and amounted to unfair competition. Photo: GABRIEL BOUYS / AFP/File
Source: AFP

German supermarket concatenation Lidl faces a 43-million-euro ($50 million) payout to a French rival aft an appeals tribunal ruled its ads to beryllium deceptive.

The Paris appeals tribunal ordered Lidl to wage the magnitude to French concatenation Intermarche aft uncovering hundreds of the television spots that it ran betwixt 2017 and 2023 were apt to deceive consumers and amounted to unfair competition.

While Intermarche mislaid the archetypal proceedings successful 2022, the appeals tribunal considered successful its July 4 ruling that Lidl's ads were deceptive arsenic the hard discount retailer had not ensured the items it promoted were disposable successful each of its shops astatine the advertised terms for a play of 15 weeks.

The appeals tribunal justice recovered that successful the much than 370 ads contested by Intermarche that Lidl had prominently featured the products and prices but had utilized tiny people oregon little off-screen dependable mentions to spot its website for participating stores.

The tribunal ruled those mentions were "likely to spell unnoticed by the user oregon astatine the precise slightest beryllium misunderstood."

Moreover, it considered that by knowing it didn't person the products disposable astatine each sites for a capable clip that Lidl's actions went from being deceptive practices to unfair competition, frankincense opening the mode for compensation to its rival.

Intermarche declined to remark erstwhile contacted by AFP.

Source: AFP