Paris and Chicago, May 10 - Merisant Worldwide, Inc., a global leader in low-calorie tabletop sweeteners, today announced its French subsidiary Merisant France SAS has won a significant victory in the Commercial Court of Paris against subsidiaries of McNeil Nutritionals LLC, the American company that markets Splenda(R).
The court awarded Merisant France a euro 40,000 ($54,000) damages and ordered the defendants to cease advertising claims found to violate French consumer protection laws.
The Court's decision strikes at the core of Splenda's global positioning. The advertising claims found to violate French law and which McNeil must cease include:
"Because it comes from sugar, sucralose tastes like sugar"
"With sucralose: Comes from sugar and tastes like sugar"
The ruling orders McNeil to amend all advertising and promotions that contain these and other claims, and to amend all packaging within a period of 30 days starting as of the service of the judgment. In addition, the Court prohibited the distribution of any products under the trademark Splenda(R) with unchanged packaging after a period of four months starting as of the service of the decision.
"We're pleased the Court held McNeil accountable for Splenda(R) advertising that we believe has intentionally fooled a significant number of consumers into thinking Splenda(R) contains sugar and no calories, and that it is a natural product; both are completely false," said Paul Block, chief executive officer of Merisant. "We want to ensure fair competition through accurate advertising so that consumers can make informed decisions about the products they're buying. This ruling is a victory not just for Merisant, but for French consumers who no longer will be misled into thinking Splenda(R) is something it's not. Splenda(R) is a synthetic compound -- created in a lab and manufactured in a chemical plant -- and is no more natural than any other low-calorie sweetener."