current events

On Tuesday, January 12, 2016, a federal district court in New York granted in part and denied in part Tito’s “Handmade” Vodka’s motion to dismiss several claims brought against it by a class of consumers in the case Singleton v. Fifth Generation, Inc.

Judge Brenda K. Sannes of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York issued the opinion, holding that federal approval of Tito’s labels does not provide Tito’s with a “safe harbor” from litigation, and that Tito’s use of the term “handmade” and the phrase “crafted in an old fashioned pot still” “could plausibly mislead a reasonable consumer to believe that [Tito’s] vodka is made in a hands-on, small-batch process.”

Judge Sannes’ decision to allow Singleton to move forward marks yet another instance of a federal judge finding merit in false labeling claims against Tito’s. Singleton joins Hoffman v. Fifth Generation, Inc. and Cabrera v. Fifth Generation, Inc. (both federal cases in California) as well as Pye v. Fifth Generation, Inc. (a federal case in Florida) and Terlesky v. Fifth Generation, Inc. (a federal case in Ohio), which have all survived motions by Tito’s to cut the cases short. Singleton is more akin to the two California cases, as the judges in all three refused to apply the safe harbor and held that the...

Over the years many have suggested that Tito’s vodka is not really made in small batches or by hand. I tried to keep an open mind, as the brand grew, and even in the face of the lawsuits summarized here.

So I have been particularly looking forward to a response, on the merits, at long last, from the source. Tito finally responded, on November 17, 2014, in the form of a motion to dismiss the Florida case. (The defendants also filed a similar motion, a month later, in the California case. The California motion is 28 pages and substantially similar to the one filed in Florida, right down to mangling the name of the agency that issued the so-crucial approvals. It does add a dash of spice here:  “Plaintiff himself knows nothing, and he filed a lawsuit that ignores what the Tito’s label actually says and instead bases his claim on hearsay statements in a magazine article, hoping he can later commit discovery to get the facts he admittedly lacks.”)

With the aid of more than one big law firm, and a superior command of the facts, I was eager to sit back and see how deftly Tito could shut down its many detractors. The motion weighs in at 20 or so pages and it does...

Tito’s vodka was doing great for the past 15 years, then hit a gigantic speedbump this week in the form of a class action lawsuit.

Tito’s therefore provides a good example of when an approval is not really an approval. Tito Beveridge has more than 30 TTB label approvals for his vodka from 1997 to 2013 (as in the above image, from LabelVision). They may not do him much good in this lawsuit, even though, in years past, most would assume the federal approval would be dispositive. It’s a good thing most TTB approvals are not paper anymore because these would “not be worth the paper they are printed on.”

Summary:  in Hofmann v. Fifth Dimension, Inc., Gary Hofmann (a consumer) sued Tito’s vodka on behalf of all Tito’s customers in California, claiming that the company misleads people about whether the product is “handmade.” The lawsuit was filed September 15, 2014 in San Diego county court. The federal government reviewed and approved the Tito’s labels, but has no definition for the term at issue.

The classic case of an approval that is not really an approval would be your garden variety Napa Valley Chardonnay, Vintage 2010. TTB will take almost every one of those...