Texas Pete’s Hot Sauce isn’t as Texas as one Los Angeles man thought, according to a class action lawsuit.
Los Angeles resident Philip White filed a lawsuit in September in California’s Central District Court against the hot sauce’s makers, North Carolina-based TW Garner Food Co., alleging false advertising after he believed that the mark was “a product of Texas,” according to North Carolina. news station WGHP-TV.
White bought a bottle of the hot sauce, which has a label with a white star (like the Texas flag) and an all-red cartoon cowboy, and “trusted the language and imagery on the front label” before your purchase, he said. the complaint
The suit alleges that the man believed the look of the tag made him look “differently Texan.” However, hot sauce originated in a Winston-Salem barbecue restaurant in 1929.
WGHP-TV reported that the lawsuit wants the hot sauce brand, which has until Nov. 10 to respond to the complaint, to “change its name and brand and pay.”
“There is nothing strikingly Texas about them,” the complaint states.
Texas Pete Hot Sauce, a condiment introduced by Sam Garner, is not directly tied to the Lone Star state, but is the result of Garner and his sons trying to come up with a name for their sauce in their barbecue restaurant, according to the brand’s website.
A marketing consultant came up with the idea for the name “Mexican Joe” hot sauce “to connote the spicy flavor reminiscent of the favorite foods of our neighbors to the south,” the brand’s site says.
Garner, however, allegedly did not hear the name.
“No, it has to have an American name!” the website claims Garner said.
The name Texas Pete was a combination of the Lone Star State name along with “Pete,” a nickname for Garner’s son, Harold, according to the website.
The complaint alleges that Texas Pete, a Louisiana-style hot sauce, is a product of ingredients “sourced outside of Texas,” and the hot sauce producer “admits that the reputation of Texas was what they were trying to imitate and exploit”.
The hot sauce brand did not immediately respond to a request for comment from HuffPost.
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