Who is Harmed By Taco Bell’s Alleged False Advertising?

Wow, I’ve eaten some bad things in the past, but this most recent (alleged) revelation about Taco Bell has got to take the cake for (alleged) worst food product to eat.

If you haven’t been watching of the news, surfing the internet, or reading the newspapers, then you may be comatose or some kind of spelling bee champion because this story is all over the place.

A couple of weeks ago, a California woman filed a lawsuit against the taco fast food giant accusing Taco Bell of not actually including beef in their beef tacos, burrito, chalupas, and whatever the heck else passes for Mexican food over there, but rather “taco meat filling.”

What is taco meat filling you ask?  Well if you’re to believe the plaintiff’s complaint, it’s a combination of “water, isolated oat product, wheat oats, soy lecithin, maltodrextrin, anti-dusting agent, autolyzed yeast extract, modified corn starch, sodium phosphate,” and other long mad scientist-sounding words.  Oh and beef, too.  I forgot to mention that amongst all the other stuff the plaintiff alleges is in Taco Bell’s beef, there’s also some beef in there.  How silly of me.

This, believe it or not friends, is exactly the heart of plaintiff’s beef (ba da bum) with Taco Bell.  She accuse the company of only putting a little above 20 percent beef in there beef products and argues that the company shouldn’t be allowed to call their meat filling beef because it’s a fraudulent statement.

Now as you can imagine, Taco Bell hasn’t taken kindly to these accusation.  However, rather than try to take the high road on this and handle the case discretely, apparently the marketing geniuses over there have decided to come out with guns-a-blazing and attack the lawsuit head-on with a full out media blitz.  The company has taken out hilarious full page ads in newspapers proclaiming their product’s beefiness.  And to further ensure that their message is heard by more than the four people left in the country who are still reading newspapers, Taco Bell also released an equally cringe-inducing and sure-to-go-viral YouTube video where Taco Bell President Greg Creed expounds upon the authenticity of the company’s beef.

The reason this public relation blitz is an odd and bad move on Taco Bell’s part is that by fighting the plaintiff’s lawsuit so vehemently and publicly, the company ensures that the lawsuit becomes more well-known than it would’ve been if they had just shut up, filed an answer, and released the usual public admonishment denouncing the lawsuit.  Instead, the lawsuit now has traction and is currently creating a logging jam on the internet.  It was also a bad move because for many people, fighting the lawsuit so adamantly can often create the impression that the lawsuit may actually have some validity behind.

Now to be fair, Taco Bell’s very vocal response was probably due to a fear that a smaller answer would’ve led to a drop in sales.  The company probably also didn’t want to watch their taco brand go the way of their fried chicken brand and forever fall into the realm of (alleged) urban legend.  I can see it now, three-breasted 50 lbs chickens clucking along peacefully next to 18-foot tall cattle.

But seriously though myths aside, this is one lawsuit where despite the growing public outcry against Taco Bell, I’m finding it hard to find any basis that would give this lawsuit any reason to continue existing, other than money of course.

You see the problem with this lawsuit (and lawsuits of this kind in general) is that the only real claim of harm lies in false advertising.  Specifically in this case, it’s that the plaintiff and all Taco Bell consumers who went to Taco Bell and bought beef tacos believed that the filling contained 100 percent beef.

Let’s assume for a moment that the plaintiff’s claim is completely true.  What would be the harm other than the deceit?  The beef itself isn’t poisonous or causing any harm to anyone who eats it, aside from probably being really unhealthy for you.  Sure, the product doesn’t contain 100 percent beef, but short of some new discovery about the beef filling’s contents, under FDA guidelines Taco Bell would still be in compliance.

The harm is in the fact that the plaintiff says Taco Bell shouldn’t call their product beef because it’s not all beef.  But take a moment and go to your pantry or refrigerator and pull out anything from it and look at the ingredients.  Chances are that your cereal, macaroni and cheese, canned vegetables, and anything else you might find in there doesn’t contain a hundred percent of anything.

Now I’m not saying that Taco Bell is completely in the right here; but when you go to Taco Bell or any major fast food chain, are you really expecting to get the freshest and best ingredients in the world?

Probably not.