COSTCO is fighting two class action lawsuits over its Rotisserie Chicken. The retailer is in court over allegations that its chickens are not preservative-free as claimed. And another suit claims COSTCO’s Nebraska chicken plant is a salmonella risk…
Inside a COSTCO Rotisserie Chicken kitchen: The retailer sells over 100 million
of the $4.99 birds each year. That’s well below the cost to produce them.
But the marketing technique – called a ‘loss-leader’ – has been
very successful in getting folks to come to the stores…
The first suit…
… Alleges that COSTCO’s rotisserie chickens are not preservative-free, as claimed. The class action lawsuit, filed on January 22 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, charges Costco misled consumers by marketing its Kirkland Signature rotisserie chicken as containing ‘no preserv-atives’. The suit claims the chicken contains sodium phosphate and carrageenan — both of which are used as preservatives to extend product shelf life and maintain texture.
The second suit…
… Alleges that COSTCO has failed to control salmonella contamination at its proprietary chicken facil-ity. The plant, located in Fremont, Nebraska, oversees COSCO’s chickens from the hatchery to the store shelf.
This suit is seeking compensatory and treble damages — meaning three times the actual damages — for shoppers who purchased rotisserie chickens or other relevant chicken products from Costco since January 1, 2019.
Where they’re at…
Neither suit has yet been certified to go forward as a class action. Trial dates have, therefore, not yet been set.
COSTCO, meanwhile, has removed signage and marketing materials that were using the ‘no preserv-atives’ wording. The retailer has as of this writing made no comment on the salmonella claim.
My take
I’ll be interested to see where these two new lawsuits eventually go. Court arguments over the pre-servative status of sodium phosphate and carrageenan should be interesting. Nd I’m very curious as to where the allegations of salmonella risk are coming from – and what evidence they’re based on…
~ Maggie J.