Fans of Kanye West are used to waiting years for the mercurial artist to drop a new album, but the state of California is putting its foot down on shipping delays by his fashion line.
Yeezy Apparel, the company founded by Ye (the name West now goes by), will pay $950,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by the Los Angeles county district attorney’s office over shipping delays and false advertisement.
The settlement was reached less than two weeks after the DA’s office sued the company for “unlawful business conduct” dating back at least four years.
Yeezy’s distinctive foam runners and slippers come in bold colors and shapes that resemble anything from clouds to a small pet, with prices ranging from $200 to nearly $500.
The first Yeezy product – a sneaker produced in collaboration with Nike – hit the market in 2009, and the brand gained design credibility and popularity over the years. By 2015, Ye had launched the second season of Yeezy products at New York Fashion Week.
A pair of Yeezy sneakers. Photograph: James Veysey/Rex/Shutterstock
But according to the Los Angeles DA, Yeezy repeatedly violated a California state law that requires online shopping items to be delivered within 30 days. In the event of delays, the statute requires the company to either refund customers’ money, replace the goods, or provide a “written notice” to the customer withdetails of how long the delay may be.
The complaint also alleged that Yeezy made “untrue or misleading statements” about its capacity to ship orders within a specific timeline, especially in cases where customers paid extra for expedited service.
“Online consumers are entitled to protection against unwarranted fees and unreasonably long waits for purchases to arrive on their doorsteps,” the district attorney, George Gascón. “We will enforce state and federal laws governing online shopping in Los Angeles county.”
Lauren E Willis, associate dean for research and law professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, said she thought it was unlikely that other companies would face legal troubles over shipping delays.
“Although false advertising is false advertising even if the business did not know at the time that it was lying, the government is likely to concentrate its limited resources on pursuing businesses for false statements about delivery only when the government believes the business knew, or any reasonable business should have known, that the statement was false,” Willis told the Guardian.
Hoon Chun, the DA’s deputy head of consumer protection, told the Guardian his office was investigating “dozens” of similar cases, but that the targets were confidential unless and until a case is filed.
In 2019, the fast fashion retailer Fashion Nova settled a similar case brought by the LA district attorney for $1.75m.
Willis says the government needs such interventions to protect consumers as well as competitors.
“When a business advertises to consumers using claims it knows are false, the government needs to come in and stop it,” she said. “It is unfair to competitors that are truthfully telling consumer shoppers that their items will not arrive for a few weeks.”
David Schindler, Ye’s lawyer, declined to comment on the settlement. Yeezy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/nov/09/yeezy-pay-950000-settle-lawsuit-slow-shipping