Retail & E-Commerce

  • December 02, 2024

    Shipping Industry Braces For Waves Of New Trump Tariffs

    After a holiday weekend marked by a fresh round of tariff threats from President-elect Donald Trump, the shipping and logistics industry is beginning to feel the heat, warning companies to prepare for massive upheaval if Trump follows through.

  • December 02, 2024

    EBay Didn't Pay Manual Workers Weekly, Suit Says

    Online retail giant eBay Inc. failed to pay manual workers at a Queens, New York, warehouse on a weekly basis as required under state and federal labor law, according to a suit filed in federal court.

  • November 27, 2024

    Google Wants 9th Circ. To Undo Play Store Ruling In Epic Row

    Google has pressed the Ninth Circuit to reverse an injunction forcing it to allow third-party app distribution on its Play Store, arguing that the lower court's ruling will "directly undercut Google's efforts to compete against Apple and the iPhone."

  • November 27, 2024

    Starbucks, Baker Botts Partner Accused Of Defaming Inventor

    An executive for a patent-licensing company that's pursuing infringement litigation against numerous restaurants over a patent that lets customers place mobile orders using a real-time menu that can make personalized suggestions accused Starbucks and its Baker Botts LLP attorney in a lawsuit Wednesday of making defamatory statements about him.

  • November 27, 2024

    'Vanderpump Rules' Star Neglecting Her TM Case, Judge Says

    A California federal judge says Bravo TV star Lala Kent missed a deadline for moving forward with a trademark case against a cosmetics consultant accused of running the "Give Them Lala" brand without her permission.

  • November 27, 2024

    Zurich Defeats Burlington's $750M COVID-19 Coverage Suit

    Zurich American has permanently defeated Burlington Stores' COVID-19 pandemic coverage suit after a New Jersey federal judge said the retailer's attempt to use "clever semantics to avoid dismissal" failed to demonstrate it suffered direct physical loss or damage to its property, or that virus particles physically altered objects or surfaces.

  • November 27, 2024

    Amazon Judge Says Appeal Too Soon In Ongoing Privacy Suit

    A Washington federal judge has said he won't issue a final judgment to allow consumers to appeal his previous ruling tossing most of the claims in a suit alleging that palm scanners at joint Starbucks-Amazon stores violate biometric privacy law, because one of the plaintiffs has a remaining claim.

  • November 27, 2024

    Wash. Appeals Court Slams Brakes On Lucid EV Dealerships

    Automaker Lucid can't sell its electric vehicles directly to Washington consumers, a state appellate court has ruled, agreeing with regulators that granting the company the necessary license would violate a state law designed to protect car dealers from unfair competition from manufacturers.

  • November 27, 2024

    DOL Sued For OSHA Info In NJ Amazon Warehouse Deaths

    The U.S. Department of Labor has been hit with a lawsuit by a labor advocate seeking records related to investigations of three deaths at Amazon.com Inc.'s "notoriously hazardous warehouses" in New Jersey in 2022, saying the agency failed to comply with Freedom of Information Act deadlines.

  • November 27, 2024

    Biden Administration Adds 65K Additional H-2B Work Visas

    The Biden administration announced Wednesday that it has created a temporary rule to add 64,716 additional temporary H-2B work visas for the third year in a row to be doled out to businesses struggling with staffing issues. 

  • November 27, 2024

    Kroger Inks $21M Deal With 47K Workers Over Pay Delay

    Approximately 47,000 Kroger employees told an Ohio federal judge Tuesday they've reached a $21 million class action settlement with the grocery giant over claims it either failed to pay them or made inaccurate deductions from their wages after switching to a new timekeeping system that experienced a glitch in 2022.

  • November 27, 2024

    Vidal Lays Out Reasoning For Reviving Lighting IP Challenge

    Binding Luminex International Co. Ltd. to one of its customers in a way that would block the company from challenging a Signify Holdings BV lighting patent at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board could lead to situations of patent owners launching infringement suits to dodge certain patent challenges, the head of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has found.

  • November 27, 2024

    Up Next At The High Court: Transgender Care, Holocaust Art

    The U.S. Supreme Court will return to the bench Monday for its December arguments session, which will include blockbuster questions about the constitutionality of state laws banning gender-affirming care for transgender minors and whether Hungary can be held liable for property stolen during World War II.

  • November 27, 2024

    Virgin Islands Mall, Lloyd's End $6M Spat Over July 4 Fire

    The owner of a historic marketplace in the U.S. Virgin Islands, which accused certain underwriters at Lloyd's of London of denying more than $6 million in claims after an Independence Day fire, agreed to drop all claims against the underwriter, according to a notice Monday.

  • November 27, 2024

    IP Atty, Wife Say Mich. Pot Co.'s Defamation Suit Is Too Old

    A Montana intellectual property attorney and his wife have urged a Michigan federal judge to dismiss a cannabis company's lawsuit alleging the couple posted falsehoods about the business on social media and made false tips to Michigan cannabis authorities, arguing that the claims are time-barred.

  • November 26, 2024

    Sundance Can't Ditch Suit Over Purchase Data Disclosures

    A Utah federal judge has refused to toss a proposed class action accusing specialty retailer Sundance of unlawfully sharing its customers' private information with various third parties, finding that a ban on class actions contained in the state law being relied on by the plaintiffs didn't doom the dispute. 

  • November 26, 2024

    Macy's Says High Court Ruling Guts DOL's Tobacco Fee Case

    Macy's urged an Ohio federal judge to ax a U.S. Department of Labor claim that the company discriminated against tobacco users by charging them an extra fee through its health insurance plan, arguing that the U.S. Supreme Court's recent Loper Bright ruling disqualifies the agency's regulations at issue.

  • November 26, 2024

    Amazon Not Liable For Chemical Used In Suicides, Panel Says

    A Washington state appeals court on Monday said Amazon can't be sued for the online sale of a chemical that four people used to kill themselves, in an opinion that said the state's product liability law has not caught up with the "previously unfathomable accessibility to instrumentalities of death."

  • November 26, 2024

    Workers Say Kroger-Albertsons No-Poach Deal Hurt Wages

    A Colorado grocery store employee has filed a putative class action accusing Kroger Co. and Albertsons Cos. Inc. of scheming to suppress workers' wages, alleging in a state court complaint that the grocers entered into an illegal "no-poach" agreement during a 2022 strike.

  • November 26, 2024

    Smart Devices Fail To Disclose Security Lifespan, FTC Says

    As holiday shopping gets underway, the Federal Trade Commission is raising alarm about smart device update disclosures, saying an overwhelming majority of devices – from hearing aids to home security cameras and fitness devices — come without clear information on how long the manufacturer will keep them protected from security risks.

  • November 26, 2024

    Google Search Judge Says AI Will Affect Remedy Phase

    The judge overseeing the government's search monopolization case against Google suggested Tuesday in D.C. federal court that artificial intelligence is shifting the market and will likely play a role in the remedies the court imposes on Google for allegedly violating antitrust law.

  • November 26, 2024

    New Orleans Property Owner Revives Bid To Nix Arbitration

    A New Orleans property owner has again urged a Louisiana federal judge to overturn his order forcing it to arbitrate a $7 million Hurricane Ida damage claim with 11 insurers for a block of luxury apartments and retail shops, pointing to a recent ruling by the state's top court.

  • November 26, 2024

    Amazon May Still Face La. Claims Over Battery Charger Fire

    A Louisiana federal judge has cut out some claims in a suit brought by a man who died in a fire allegedly caused by a defective battery charger sold on Amazon by a Chinese company, but said the online retailer should still face some claims under state law since it stored, labeled and shipped the charger.

  • November 26, 2024

    Hemp Org. Warns Farm Bill Would Ban Some Legal Products

    A major hemp trade organization said Tuesday the Senate Democrats' version of the Farm Bill has some "concerning" implications for hemp that could result in product bans.

  • November 26, 2024

    Best Buy Must Face Suit Over Deliveryman Sex Assault

    A New York state appeals court on Tuesday reinstated a suit seeking to hold Best Buy liable for a delivery worker's sexual assault of a customer, saying the dismissal was improperly based on the testimony of a manager who was hired seven years after the incident occurred.

Expert Analysis

  • New Law May Move Calif. Toward Fashion Sustainability

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    California’s recently signed Responsible Textile Recovery Act seeks to increase sustainability innovation in the fashion industry, but it could also create compliance hurdles for brands, especially smaller fashion houses that do not have ample resources, say Warren Koshofer and Maggie Franz at Michelman & Robinson.

  • Antitrust In Retail: Why FTC Is Studying 'Surveillance Pricing'

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    The Federal Trade Commission's decision to study targeted "surveillance pricing" should provide greater clarity into the nature of the data aggregation industry, but also raises several issues, including whether these practices are in fact illegal under any established interpretations of U.S. antitrust law, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Mental Health First Aid: A Brief Primer For Attorneys

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    Amid a growing body of research finding that attorneys face higher rates of mental illness than the general population, firms should consider setting up mental health first aid training programs to help lawyers assess mental health challenges in their colleagues and intervene with compassion, say psychologists Shawn Healy and Tracey Meyers.

  • Series

    Collecting Art Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    The therapeutic aspects of appreciating and collecting art improve my legal practice by enhancing my observation skills, empathy, creativity and cultural awareness, says attorney Michael McCready.

  • The Trade And Tax Issues Behind US-Canada Digital Tax Clash

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    The new Canadian digital services tax recently went into effect despite objections from the U.S., a controversy that represents an unusual mix of trade and tax policy, and many companies have been pondering how it will affect their e-commerce businesses, says Damon Pike at BDO.

  • Secret Service Failures Offer Lessons For Private Sector GCs

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    The Secret Service’s problematic response to two assassination attempts against former President Donald Trump this summer provides a crash course for general counsel on how not to handle crisis communications, says Keith Nahigian at Nahigian Strategies.

  • Litigation Inspiration: Honoring Your Learned Profession

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    About 30,000 people who took the bar exam in July will learn they passed this fall, marking a fitting time for all attorneys to remember that they are members in a specialty club of learned professionals — and the more they can keep this in mind, the more benefits they will see, says Bennett Rawicki at Hilgers Graben.

  • Opinion

    AI May Limit Key Learning Opportunities For Young Attorneys

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    The thing that’s so powerful about artificial intelligence is also what’s most scary about it — its ability to detect patterns may curtail young attorneys’ chance to practice the lower-level work of managing cases, preventing them from ever honing the pattern recognition skills that undergird creative lawyering, says Sarah Murray at Trialcraft.

  • A Class Action Trend Tests Limit Of Courts' Equity Powers

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    A troubling trend has developed in federal class action litigation as some counsel and judges attempt to push injunctive relief classes under Rule 23(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure beyond the traditional limits of federal courts' equitable powers, say attorneys at Jones Day.

  • A Look At How De Minimis Import Rules May Soon Change

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    The planned implementation of executive actions focused on the de minimis rule as it applies to shipments means companies should use this interval to evaluate the potential applicability and impact of Section 301, Section 201 or Section 232 duties on their products, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Antitrust Issues To Watch Amid Google Ad Tech Trial

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    Regardless of the outcome of the U.S. Department of Justice's advertising technology antitrust suit against Google in Virginia federal court, matters ranging from market definition to unified pricing will likely have far-reaching implications for the digital advertising industry, competition and innovation, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • What To Know About Latest Calif. Auto-Renewal Law Update

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    While businesses have about nine months to prepare before the recently passed amendment to California's automatic renewal law takes effect, it’s not too early to begin working on compliance efforts, including sign-up flow reviews, record retention updates and marketing language revisions, say Gonzalo Mon and Beth Chun at Kelley Drye.

  • How Lucia, Jarkesy Could Affect Grocery Merger Challenge

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    While the Federal Trade Commission is taking a dual federal court and administrative tribunal approach to block Kroger's merger with Alberstons, Kroger's long-shot unconstitutionality claims could potentially lead to a reevaluation of the FTC's reliance on administrative processes in complex merger cases, say attorneys at Saul Ewing.

  • How To Avoid Liability When Using Cookie Consent Managers

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    As companies attempt to comply with consumer protection laws by implementing cookie consent managers on their websites, they must be wary of separate legal risks that can stem from implementing or using these tools incorrectly, says Ian Cohen at LOKKER.

  • Basel Endgame Rules: A Change Is Coming

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    The Federal Reserve Board's recently announced recalibration of the Basel endgame proposal begins a critical chapter in the evolution of not only the safety and soundness of U.S. banks, but also of banks' abilities to lend and support American businesses and consumers, say attorneys at Davis Wright.

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