Update October 2010: Judge Richard Seeborg has taken over the case and rejected Ganz’s motion to dismiss the plaintiff’s amended complaint. The court held that the amended complaint includes specific allegations of anticompetitive effects, such as the alternate suppliers who the plaintiffs had stopped buying from as a result of the defendant’s tying practices, which the initial complaint had omitted.
In In re: Webkinz Antitrust Litigation, Northern District of California Judge Jeffrey S. White dismissed four claims in antitrust multidistrict litigation alleging that Ganz Inc., the supplier of the popular Webkinz toys, required retailers to buy unrelated gift items in order to obtain the plush animals. While leaving the claims under Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act and Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act in tact, the court dismissed allegations that that Ganzi violated antitrust law and California Unfair Competition Law, among other claims, holding plaintiffs failed to state a claim, but gave plaintiffs a chance to amend their complaint. In dismissing the claims, the court held that “[p]laintiffs summarily assert that consumers have been harmed, but do not allege facts demonstrating that consumers have suffered any injury as a result of limited choices of the tied products in plaintiffs’ stores, … [and c]onclusory allegations of anti-competitive effect are insufficient without supporting facts as to how competition in the tied markets has actually been reduced or harmed.”