Lawyer of the Day: Crusader Calls Sears’s Bluff
We’ve all seen commercials where a company promises to meet a competitor’s lowest price on an item. But a Long Island lawyer decided to put one of these guarantees to the test:
In its advertising, Sears vows to match competitors’ prices, but one Long Island lawyer has been walking a long road of disillusionment after the retailer refused to live up to its promises. Back in 2007, when Warren Dank showed employees at a Hicksville Sears ad clippings from competitors selling a 46-inch flat-screen for as low as $2,400—$1,200 less than what Sears was charging for the exact same product—a manager refused to budge on the price. And so Dank found his life’s calling: He drove around to three different Sears outlets in the metropolitan area and was denied the promised discount every time.
This is hero-lawyering at its best. Sure, the remedy might simply be more fine print at the bottom of the screen. And, fine, there could be costs associated with defending against this type of litigation that raises the price of televisions for all consumers. But hey, that’s just more work for more lawyers.
Dank might be stimulating the legal economy, but of course, somebody is going to have to pay:
A lot of people are calling Dank a hero (okay, just us), and he might not disagree, telling the Post: “I’m doing this single-handedly. No one else pushed it this far to go on a crusade.” UPDATE: Mr. Dank just emailed us with the following clarification: “Please set the record straight on your blog that the $100 and/or $300 million is to pay a class action settlement to all of the customers who were deceived and not to me.”
That’s the plaintiff’s bar, hard at work baby! Companies shouldn’t make promises they can’t keep.
Lawyer Sues Sears for Millions Over Their Flat Screen Prices [Gothamist]
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Comments
first? if not then Second? if not then Third?
I imagine he'll be using Restatement 90 as the centerpiece of his argument.
snarf
Dank firm to 190...
first?
2, kill yourself.
Is it illegal in Texas to pound your secretary in the ass?
No, 6. It's actually a job requirement. If you don't do it, you'll get your pay docked. Similarly, Texas law says you must set deadly traps in your home to kill would-be burglars.
6 - lawrence v texas says it is perfectly legal. pound away
Are there any lawyers who said they would match any competitors' price? How about matching the $5/question guy?
2 nailed it, but remember to plead in the alternative: either enforce the language of the contract, or bring down the promissory estoppel-hammer.
6 - I don't know. I would go look it up, but I'm too busy (you can figure out the rest...)
i consider him a hero too.
way to fight for the little guy's rights to buy discounted plasma tv's! (not sarcastic)
First!
Superb job, Ellie. Absolutely fine journalism.
Nice job elie. Who, what, when, where, how. I've got an ad, a failure to match the price, a qoute re: heroism, and a reference to a few million $. Who was quoted? Was there a complaint filed? What happened?
The Plasma TV Crusade
"You will sell me this plasma for cheap!"
Excluding some words I must bleep,
This is what Dank exclaimed
To the sales rep he blamed.
The manager, he said, was a creep.
Sears was silent, it had no retort,
So Dank turned this into a sport:
With a flyer from Best Buy
He said "Yep, I'm THAT guy,
You can give me my TV in court!"
"And those other nice shoppers you screwed?
My complaint is on their behalf too!"
And so it began,
He unhatched his plan
To ensure that others aren't Jewed.
-- by: The Limericker
15, you moron. Elie clearly identifies the guy as Warren Dank and makes it clear that there was a class action settlement.
Sears sucks. They've been ripping off customers for many years. They've been fined many times for deceptive advertising, bait and switch, and outright fraud. For a company that used to be the go-to place, it's fallen far, past time for closure nationwide.
Hey, 16! I hate Jews too! Let's be friends!
17- so dank refers to himself in the third person and use the royal we? Contracts exam is coming up. Get back to studying.
"You'll sell me this plasma for cheap!"
Excluding some words I must bleep,
That's what Dank exclaimed
To the sales rep he blamed.
The manager, he said, was a creep.
Sears was silent and had no retort,
So Dank turned this into a sport:
With a flyer from Best Buy
He said "Yep, I'm THAT guy,
You can give me my TV in court!"
"And those other nice shoppers you screwed?
My complaint is on their behalf too!"
And so it began,
He unhatched his plan
To ensure that others aren't Jewed.
THIS THREAD IS USELESS WITHOUT PICS.
Hmm, sounds like a lawyer who doesn't have enough work to keep him busy. Driving around to FOUR Sears stores??? Good grief, get a life....
How is $100 and/or $300 million a settlement? Does Sears have the choice?
20, go back to the unemployement line. Or take a course in reading comprehension.
This is a straight-forward deceptive trade practices case. Good for him.
Class actions settlements are settlements like any other. In that they are voluntarily and the parties agree to the terms. But they must be approved by the court under the F.R.C.P. and vitrually every state class action statute. Jeez, everyone here must be a laid-off corporate lawyer...
17- plaese explain the terms of the settlement to those of us who didn't take reading comp at fsu.
There was no settlement. Elie made that up. Dank is SEEKING to settle the class action with Sears for $100 to $300 million.
I think there's a paragraph missing or something--first he's driving around to local sears, then we're in the middle of litigation with no transition?!?!
I think there's a paragraph missing or something--first he's driving around to local sears, then we're in the middle of litigation with no transition?!?!
@29- perhaps elie should have said that. Probably wouldn't hurt if he mentioned the guy filed a complaint, ya know, after driving to those four sears stores. Maybe this is today's "non-sequitirs"
If he could get it cheaper somewhere else, why not just buy it there?
Guys at my high school used to drill their Texas secretaries from behind all the time, it was no big deal.
I'd love to know the theory on which this guy claims $300m in damages when the product could be had at the competitor's place. Did he go to sears just to buy that tv, and end up spending all his money on jeans? I guess elie found questions like that irrelevant. I somehow think sears didn't yet settle this slam dunk case.
This is just like the dry cleaning case. When will these practicers of deceptive trade learn that if you deceive the public, you're going to pay? This is big time stuff.
"Sears's" - really?
The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, 15 U.S.C. 2301, regulates advertised guarantees. If an advertiser "guarantees" something, they gotta honor it or I will nail them.
Please post other culprits for me to chase.
--Laid off litigator.
Wow. You're truly unable to write a story to save your life.
39 - I'm pretty sure this story was written to amuse and inform, not to save a life.
37 - Really.
See Strunk & White's "The Elements of Style." Rule One: "Form the possessive singular of nouns with 's. Follow this rule whatever the final consonant. Thus write Charles's friend, Burns's poems, the witch's malice."
Looks like Elie guessed correctly.
Isn't this a run of the mill class action?
I don't see what is newsworthy about this, there are hundreds of these type of suits in litigation right now.
"Looks like Elie guessed correctly."
Certainly by chance.
Nice 21. Jew 'em down.
37:
41 beat me to it, but it's also in the CMS. Really. Mystal-bashing fail.
-- law review doosh
40--but it doesn't inform well. There is some accidentally excised sentence here or something.
Ok--$100 mil lawsuit is ridiculous, but so are the "Price Match" policies of Sears, Home Depot, Lowes and other big stores.
What Mr. Dank doesn't realize is that the TV he saw in the ad is NOT the same. The Sears model is the Acme 1234"S" model (available only at Sears). But the one he saw in the ad for the other store (say--Best Buy) was the ACME 1234"BB" model (available only at Best Buy)--completely different.
I don't feel bad for Sears at all. I hope he sticks it to them.
Ok--$100 mil lawsuit is ridiculous, but so are the "Price Match" policies of Sears, Home Depot, Lowes and other big stores.
What Mr. Dank doesn't realize is that the TV he saw in the ad is NOT the same. The Sears model is the Acme 1234"S" model (available only at Sears). But the one he saw in the ad for the other store (say--Best Buy) was the ACME 1234"BB" model (available only at Best Buy)--completely different.
I don't feel bad for Sears at all. I hope he sticks it to them.
I think we are missing some information.
"Hmm, sounds like a lawyer who doesn't have enough work to keep him busy. Driving around to FOUR Sears stores??? Good grief, get a life...."
Yes, because I remember in BIGLAW that all of the time I spent defending such cases was entirely worthwhile and valuable.