Stanley Customers Are Suing Over the Lead in Their Tumblers
What started out as TikTok videos about Stanley's popular Quencher tumblers containing lead has become full-blown lawsuits. NBC News reports that Pacific Market International, the parent company of Stanley, is being sued in two states by a Seattle-based law firm over the presence of lead in its tumblers.
Two separate lawsuits were started by two women, one from California and one from Nevada. They claim they would not have purchased the cups if they had known that they contained lead.
Following the buzz on social media about potential lead in Stanley products, the brand confirmed in a statement in January that its products do in fact contain some lead. The company's statement told consumers that the Quenchers are sealed using pellets that contain lead. It's an inaccessible feature at the bottom of its product, the company said.
“Our manufacturing process currently employs the use of an industry standard pellet to seal the vacuum insulation at the base of our products; the sealing material includes some lead...Rest assured that no lead is present on the surface of any Stanley product that comes into contact with the consumer nor the contents of the product,” read the statement.
Stanley said the brand will "vigorously defend itself against meritless claims."
“As we have shared, there is no lead present on the surface of any Stanley product that comes into contact with the consumer nor the contents of the product," the statement said.
Despite this claim, the lawsuit states that if the tumbler is damaged or worn, this could lead to the seal breaking and exposing the tumbler user to lead. The lawsuit also adds that the inclusion of lead is something Stanley manufacturers and designers were aware of for years "but chose to conceal it from the public presumably to avoid losing sales."
One of the plaintiffs alleges that Stanley has continued to “conceal the known risks and failed to warn of known or scientifically knowable dangers and risks associated with ingesting lead,” which is known to be dangerous even in trace amounts.
In the TikTok videos that have gone viral, Stanley users can be seen testing their tumblers for lead using a reactive agent home test kit. Although the tumblers tested positive, there are some questions regarding the reliability of such tests.
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