Amazon's $5 billion sales have failed! Will face class action lawsuit

Products are crucial to brands and sellers. Good products can not only directly affect the economic benefits of sellers, but also help sellers increase their visibility and quickly capture market share in the fierce market competition.

Once there is a problem with the product, it will not only cause economic and reputational losses to the brand and seller, but in serious cases, they may even face lawsuits.

Recently, Stanley, a well-known seller in the water bottle category on Amazon , was recalled by the quality supervision agency due to product problems and was sued by injured buyers.

After more than 3 million products were "turned over" worldwide , the big seller faces a class action lawsuit

The cause of the incident dates back to last month.

On December 12, 2024 (US time), the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued a recall notice, announcing the recall of 11 numbered travel mugs in Stanley's Switchback and Trigger Action series, involving approximately 2.6 million units.

The items were sold online and offline through Amazon, Walmart, Target and other channels between June 2016 and December 2024, with prices ranging from US$20 to US$50 .

The notice pointed out that the reason for the recall is that the threads of the cup lids of these water cups may shrink under heat or torque, causing the cup lids to fall off, thereby posing a risk of scalding.

On the same day, Canada also announced a recall of these two cups, involving approximately 184,000 products . The reason for the recall was also that the cup lids were at risk of "accidentally falling off" during use , which could cause burns to users.

Five days later, Stanley announced the recall of more than 400,000 defective Switchback and Trigger Action series products in the Brazilian market .

In addition, Stanley alone received 91 reports of bottle caps falling off worldwide (two of which occurred in the United States), 38 of which resulted in scalding accidents, with a total of 11 injured people requiring medical treatment.

Regarding the problematic product parts, in addition to discontinuing use, Stanley said the company has redesigned them to improve the fit between the cup lid and the cup body to reduce the risk of the cup lid falling off during use, and will provide new lids free of charge to all consumers who have purchased the problematic products.

However, Stanley's remedies for the problematic products sparked dissatisfaction among consumers.

Half a month after the product recall was announced, American consumers filed a class action lawsuit against Stanley's parent company, Seattle-based Pacific Market International (PMI).

The class action lawsuit was filed by Danielle Scherzi, a New York consumer who bought a 12-ounce Trigger Action at Target in 2022. But after she got home, the lid of the cup fell off twice when it was filled with hot coffee, and the hot coffee spilled on Scherzi.

Scherzi said in the lawsuit that "this product is basically worthless." Scherzi believes that Stanley's remedy is inadequate when the cup lid defect recall covers 11 product numbers, and the recall webpage is "hidden in an inconspicuous corner of Stanley's website", resulting in many people not knowing about the danger.

In addition, Scherzi also believes that PMI knew about the problem with the cup lid after pre-release testing. Scherzi said that during the sales period of the water cup from June 2016 to December 2024, PMI monitored warranty claim data, customer complaints, replacement parts data, etc. to determine whether these cup lids had the same problem; but Stanley issued a recall notice when the problems with the cup lids increased. The lawsuit also mentioned that "all refund requests were rejected... Consumers had only one choice: to receive a replacement cup lid."

It is worth mentioning that under the news on Top Class Actions (a website that provides news and information on class action lawsuits), at least two consumers said that they were also burned, and many consumers said, "Count me in (for the class action lawsuit)."

Timely relief? The brand is popular on TikTok again, with more than 12 million views of the video

Although Stanley has only entered the public eye in recent years, it is a genuine century-old brand. It was founded by inventor William Stanley Jr. in 1913 and later acquired by PMI.

On Amazon, Stanley has several products with monthly sales of over 10,000, especially the Quencher H2.0 FlowState Stainless Steel Vacuum Insulated Travel Mug, which has been ranked first on the BestSeller list in the "Tumblers & Water Glasses" category many times.

This 30-ounce cup costs $35 and has sold more than 50,000 units in the past month. Based on this number, Stanley's sales on Amazon alone amounted to more than $1.75 million (about RMB 12.8299 million ).

Stanley’s popularity is inseparable from the contribution of social media platforms.

In November 2023, a woman shared a video on TikTok: her car caught fire and the whole car was burned beyond recognition. In this case, the Stanley water cup in the car was intact, and even the ice in the cup was not affected.

Once the video was uploaded, it instantly attracted the attention and discussion of many foreign netizens, and the Stanley brand quickly swept the world. The video has now been played over 100 million times.

Stanley's CEO also took advantage of this "flood of wealth" and said he would give the consumer a product and a new car. The sincere and caring response, coupled with the performance during the fire, earned Stanley a large number of supporters.

However, in the final analysis, opportunities always come to those who are prepared. Stanley's popularity on TikTok is ultimately due to its high product quality and accurate brand positioning.

Although Stanley was positioned as durable, long-lasting and strong at the beginning , its customers were mostly soldiers, railway workers and outdoor enthusiasts. After being acquired, PMI adjusted its marketing strategy while retaining the brand tone. It adjusted the target audience to women in a timely manner based on audience feedback, and linked with well-known brands and celebrities to increase the brand's public awareness. This gave it the opportunity to become a hit on TikTok.

After becoming popular, Stanley's sales in 2023 reached US$750 million (approximately RMB 5.279 billion), especially in November and December, the sales of Stanley cups were 712,000 and 1.168 million respectively, a year-on-year increase of 125.8% and 135% ; by mid-January 2024, Stanley thermos still ranked first in sales in the category, with a share of up to 40%.

Coincidentally, after the class action lawsuit, a video posted by an American couple on TikTok made Stanley popular on social media again.

In the video, the couple filmed their house after it was burned down. In the ruins, the only item that was preserved intact was a Stanley cup, and the video captioned "We trust Lainey Wilson's Stanley!!!!".

(Image source: TikTok)

From the comments, we can see that Stanley is very popular. Some netizens think Stanley should enter the house-building industry or produce safes, while others joked that "it's time to launch Stanley Homes and Autos", and some netizens said that valuables should be placed in Stanley. However, most netizens think that " this will become Stanley's second best marketing advertisement ". The video has been viewed 12.4 million times.

In general, although some series have design problems, the overall quality of Stanley products is acceptable. This also serves as a reminder to all cross-border sellers that both product design and product selection must be tested and tried out for a sufficient amount of time. Once possible problems are discovered, timely adjustments should be made rather than relying on luck.

Just like Stanley this time, although its popularity among passers-by is still there, the economic and reputational losses caused by the replacement of product parts, delivery, and some users "unfollowing" and filing lawsuits due to unreasonable product design cannot be ignored. If it happens a few more times, even a brand of Stanley's level will inevitably be damaged.

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