AUSTRALIA | QSR chain Grill's is in court for allegedly misleading customers about donations made from its "Tree Day Tuesday" campaigns.
The ACCC has commenced proceedings in the Federal Court against Grill’d for allegedly making false or misleading representations to customers about the circumstances in which it would make donations to an environmental cause, in breach of the Australian Consumer Law.
Between January 2021 and April 2024, Grill’d ran a promotional campaign called Tree Day Tuesday, in which the ACCC alleges Grill’d made various representations, including that it would donate AUD 1 from every burger purchased on a Tuesday towards the planting of trees.
“We allege Grill’d misled customers by overstating the extent of the donations it would make and the environmental contributions from its Tree Day Tuesday promotion. We consider this to be a form of greenwashing,” ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said.
“In fact, only a small percentage of purchases on Tuesdays qualified for a donation by Grill’d because of the detailed conditions of the promotion, which we say were not disclosed or not adequately disclosed to customers.”
For a purchase to qualify for a donation under Grill’d’s Tree Day Tuesday promotion, it had to satisfy the following conditions:
- the purchase had to be made on a Tuesday,
- the purchase had to be of a ‘main item’ (being a burger or a salad),
- the buyer had to be a member of Grill’d’s Relish loyalty program,
- the purchase had to be dine-in only and not takeaway, online order, or delivery,
- dine-in orders had to be placed at the front counter (orders made via QR code at a table did not qualify),
- the buyer had to scan their loyalty program barcode at the counter when ordering, and
- the purchase could not be made in conjunction with any other offer.
Over five million burgers were bought on a Tuesday during the period between January 2021 and April 2024, but only around four per cent of those purchases qualified for a donation by Grill’d under its Tree Day Tuesday promotion.
Of those five million burgers, more than one million burgers were bought by Relish members, but only about 17 percent of those purchases qualified for a donation under the promotion.
The ACCC’s case includes 26 separate Grill’d advertisements on social media, online and in-store. While the extent to which these conditions were disclosed to consumers varied between these ads, the ACCC alleges that the ads all overstated the circumstances in which donations or contributions would be made.
“Grill’d is a large fast-food chain and operates across Australia, meaning that its conduct had the potential to mislead many consumers nationwide about the environmental benefits of their purchase,” Cass-Gottlieb said.
“We allege that Grill’d deprived consumers of the ability to make an informed decision by overstating the circumstances in which it would make a donation to an environmental cause, which may also have given Grill’d an unfair competitive advantage.”
Cass-Gottlieb said that any business that seeks to appeal to consumers’ environmental concerns must make sure that its claims are accurate and that any conditions or qualifications are adequately disclosed.
“When we see a business seeking to exploit a consumer’s environmental concerns through misleading or deceptive conduct, we will not hesitate to take appropriate enforcement action.”
Subscribe to the Restaurant & Café newsletter for weekly industry updates and event coverage.
