OMG! It's raining free make up! From an AP story that ran in Business Week:
Starting next week, several big retailers will giveaway $175 million worth of free high-end cosmetics including such brands as Estee Lauder and L'Oreal to consumers as part of a class-action settlement alleging that the stores planned to fix prices.
Department stores such as Macy's and Nordstrom will distribute free cosmetics as long as supplies last to shoppers who bought certain cosmetics between May 29, 1994 and July 16, 2003 to settle claims that the stores violated antitrust laws and tried to fix prices.
The offer is part of an agreement to settle a lawsuit filed in 2003 in a California federal court. The suit alleges stores tried to limit sales and scale back on the amount of cosmetics in their inventory, thereby keeping both prices and competition high.
The department stores involved in the matter have denied any wrongdoing.
The products will be available starting Jan. 20. Shoppers are only permitted to receive one product made by cosmetic companies that include Chanel, Estee Lauder and L'Oreal USA, among others.
Yay for class-action lawsuits. I most certainly bought make up during those years. Here is a list of what you can get for free. You know I'm obsessed. Enjoy!
Did you buy make up between 1994 and 2003? If so, what do you think about the alleged price fixing by these big corporations? What free cosmetic would you like to get? I'm going straight for the Estee Lauder night repair. I refuse to smell like Jessica Parker. I don't care if it is just a shower gel! I kid. I kid!
Thanks Q. for the tip!
I have the feeling that Boucheron will be the first to go. Grrr - they aren't even giving away anything very good! Perfume has a huge markup, so it's not like they are losing any money giving this stuff away.
Posted by: GLM | January 16, 2009 at 09:42 AM
I don't understand. What do we do to redeem. Just go to the store and say we are apart of the class action lawsuit?
Posted by: Prasanna | January 16, 2009 at 03:04 PM
I use on of the makeups in the suit and I thought it was priced too high. Perhaps the better giveaway would have been to bring in one used container of their product and get a replacement free. But that's te way it goes in these class action suits where the class is too enormous to list.
Posted by: Lou | January 17, 2009 at 12:02 PM
$25 max??!!! One product??? I had a job and discretionary money during the listed period. I purchased A LOT of items sold by these manufacturers and I get ONE product worth $25 (course I've also heard $25-37; woo woo). I have yet to find any directions for requesting a product. My name isn't on the list for the class action suit, though I was on many of the customer lists for these cosmetics, hmmmmm. So, are they going to stamp the back of my hand or what? Or is there some list 'we' should be on and when our name can't be found, we're out of luck? Has anyone heard anything? Too bad the folks who started the class action suit didn't insist that each person could receive ONE item from EACH cheating makeup company. It is becoming difficult to trust anyone in this day and age.
Posted by: Maureen | January 18, 2009 at 04:30 AM
Thanks for this info.
Posted by: PJD | January 19, 2009 at 01:30 PM