Overview
- Emma Sleep must pay A$15 million in penalties split between its Australian arm and its Southeast Asia unit, and it must publish corrective notices and run a court-ordered compliance program.
- The ACCC found 74 products were marketed with a lower sale price next to a higher strikethrough price, yet 58 were never sold at the higher price and the rest were almost never sold at that level.
- The company used countdown clocks that reset and phrases like “Ending Soon” to push shoppers to buy, which the court found created a false sense of urgency.
- The conduct ran from June 2020 to March 2023 and drew more than 4.9 million site visits, over 243,000 sales, and about A$134 million in revenue.
- The court said the tactics were a deliberate marketing strategy and ACCC Commissioner Luke Woodward said the companies breached Australian Consumer Law by giving consumers a false impression of savings.