This Popular Clothing Chain Is Under Fire for Allegedly "Misleading" Shoppers

A number of retailers have been sued by consumers recently.

Countless businesses have been hit with consumer lawsuits in recent months, including some names you know well.

Back in May, a shopper sued CVS over claims that it misleads consumers into buying its store-brand alcohol-based hand sanitizer by advertising that it kills 99.9 percent of germs—which the plaintiff alleges has been "scientifically proven" not to be true.

And just this month, a lawsuit was filed against Walmart for its store-brand Great Value Chocolate Caramel Coffee Creamer, as one shopper claimed that the product and Walmart's marketing of it violates both federal and consumer laws, because it is a coffee whitener, not a creamer.

Now, another popular retailer is facing a lawsuit over allegations that it is "misleading" shoppers.

A well known clothing company has been accused of false advertising.

A new consumer lawsuit has been levied against H&M, The Fashion Law reported. According to the news outlet, plaintiff Chelsea Commodore filed the suit in a New York federal court on July 22, alleging that the popular clothing chain is "misleading" shoppers into buying its products through false advertising. Commodore claims that H&M is "taking advantage of consumers' interest" in sustainability and in products that "do not harm the environment."

"The goal of H&M’s advertising scheme is to market and sell products that capitalize on the growing segment of consumers who care about the environment, but H&M does so in a misleading and deceptive way," the suit states, per Top Class Actions.

Best Life has reached out to H&M for comment on the lawsuit, but has not yet heard back.

The lawsuit claims that H&M is falsifying data to sell products.

In 2021, H&M introduced "Sustainability Profiles" to a select number of its products. "Each product is given a score based on the environmental impact of the materials used to make it," the clothing chain explained at the time. "On each product, customers will also see detailed data on impacts relating to water use, global warming, fossil fuel use and water pollution."

But Commodore's lawsuit claims that these Sustainability Profiles include falsified information that does not match the actual data for hundreds of products. "For example, one Sustainability Profile claimed that a dress was made with 20 percent less water on average, when it was actually made with 20 percent more water," the suit states.

By using "inaccurate and misleading data" on its Sustainability Profiles, Commodore alleges that H&M is "misrepresent[ing] its products as being better for the environment than comparable garments, when they are not."

Shoppers may be paying more for items that are not more sustainable.

The lawsuit alleges that a majority of the products H&M markets as being sustainably-made are "no more sustainable than items in [its] main collection, which are also not sustainable." This misleads consumers "who pay a price premium in the belief that they are buying truly sustainable and environmentally friendly clothing," the suit claims.

H&M "seeks to differentiate itself from other fashion products by greenwashing the products and its brand," Commodore states. "[This is] a deceptive act and an unfair practice because [H&M], one of fashion’s greatest polluters, knows that the products are not sustainable and contribute to significant negative environmental harms over the entire product life cycle from cultivation to incineration."

As a result, Commodore claims that she and other shoppers have "suffered economic injury," as they "would not have purchased the products or paid as much if the true facts had been known."