Shock! “Double Stuf Oreos Don’t Actually Have Double The Creme” (Update: co. denies)

According to a math teacher’s calculations, a sample yielded only 1.86 times as much filling between the chocolatey wafers, not “double.” Here’s the report, by Rachel Tepper in Huffington Post. Using comments, who would like to predict whether some law firm will file an intended class action over this problem within the next twelve months, on a scale where zero indicates “completely confident that there will not be such a lawsuit” and 10 indicates “completely confident that there will be”?

Bonus, from the article: “And Mega Stuf Oreos have only 2.86 times the creme in a regular Oreo. The prefix ‘mega’ literally means a factor of one million, which, granted, is impossible to translate to an Oreo. Still, perhaps another name could have sufficed.”

P.S. As a reminder, class action lawyers sued the Subway restaurant chain after it was reported that its “Footlong” sub was actually more like 11 inches long. And a federal judge is reconsidering a recent ruling allowing class action claims to go forward over the appearance on an ingredient list of “evaporated cane juice,” i.e., sugar.

P.P.S. Welcome Digg and Fark readers.

Update: “While I’m not familiar with what was done in the classroom setting, I can confirm for you that our recipe for the Oreo Double Stuf Cookie has double the Stuf, or creme filling, when compared with our base, or original Oreo cookie,” a spokeswoman for Nabisco told ABC News.

43 Comments

  • After all these years, I feel so ripped off.

  • I’d rather sue over the spelling of “Stuf.”

  • If the math is right, which I kinda doubt, that’d be like selling a 15 foot boat as a 16 foot boat. If someone really tried hard to rip off a lot of people a little bit, they should go to jail.

  • Coming soon: Oreo 186% Stuf.

    Wait, that’s misleading because it implies that 186% of the total volume of the Oreo is “Stuf”.

    Coming soon: Oreo Significantly-Increased Stuf.

  • I should have also mentioned that if there is indeed a class-action lawsuit here, the damages and attorney fees should be paid entirely in Stuf.

  • Well, buying a “double” burger would expect to get two patties of the same size, patties of the same size I would expect to find in a “single” burger. “Mega” seems to be more sales puffery than literal; “double” seems to lend itself more to a literal interpretation.

    Class action likelihood? A 6 or 7 out of ten. Lawyers will reap millions and Oreo will change the name to “extra” stuff or something similar and hand out 50-cent coupons no one will redeem.

  • Has anyone thought to sue over the fact that toothpaste tubes are designed to make it impossible to get the last couple of brushfulls out of the tube. If even 1% of all that toothpaste was too difficult to dispense, think of all the money spent on toothpaste you could sue over.

    BTW Yes I’m kidding.

  • 7

  • Just goes to show that you can’t trust anybody. As for the lawsuit, I vote “12”.

    /Going grocery shopping this afternoon; I may pick up a package of Oreos.

  • I’d love to see an Oreo with a 10^6 measurement of filling. Imagine the calorie count on that one. And the size of the glass of milk to dip it.

  • Let’s think of other things to get outraged by that could happen.

  • Jim,

    http://blogs.laweekly.com/informer/2011/09/toothpaste_lawsuit_crest_neat_squeeze.php

    WO probably had a story about this way back then…

  • Silly me,

    It was number two in google’s list from my search:

    http://overlawyered.com/2011/09/cant-squeeze-the-last-20-of-toothpaste-from-the-tube-sue/

  • what if oreo counters that the orig stuffing was oversized, rather than the doubler being undersized. what is the “standard?”

  • “Using comments, who would like to predict whether some law firm will file an intended class action over this problem within the next twelve months, on a scale where zero indicates “completely confident that there will not be such a lawsuit” and 10 indicates “completely confident that there will be”?”

    No brainer — at least a 10.

    The real challenge is the name who will be the principal beneficiaries of the cy pres settlement?

    I believe that it will be Calorie Counters of Southern California (a as yet not existant organization which will come into being with Mixie, the lead plaintiff’s trophie wife, as incorporator and CEO. It will be dedicated to healthy eating and ensuring lack of tan lines by exposure to natural tanning stimulants while reposing on silicate strata substances.*

    *(or, as we used to say, topless on the beach while drinking diet sodas and eating lo-cal snacks).

  • There’s one lawyer certainly ready to take a shot:
    http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NL_pRiXov7Q

  • topless on the beach

    Surely that will still leave some lines. As they say in Germany, “Friestrand!”

  • Still waiting for someone to blow the lid off the Doublemint Gum scam. I swear I never had an iota more “pleasure” or “fun” from chewing it (as the ads promised I would), so I seriously doubt there was double the mint.

  • Was there not a lawsuit about a foot long sandwich from subway that was only 11.5 inches or so. Not so much a speculative might story, much more likly a certainty.

  • Coming soon: we find out that the fellow with the beard who shills for Don Equis beer in TV ads is not actually The World’s Most Interesting Man.
    Cy pres money will go to a foundation for the Boring and Tiresome, which I am in the process of organizing (got one member already).

  • I was sure when I posted the question, I’d get at least a couple of answers like that….

  • Maybe that is why they spell it Stuf because it doesn’t have the full stuff.

  • That’s right, Peter! Because it happened with one product, it will certainly happen with this one. So let’s get back to all of these great jokes that are really funny.

    WFJAG, I’ll put it at a 3. I mean, there are a million lawyers so it only takes just one to speak for all of us. But I think a 3 is right.

  • @Fox2! :

    How true. But, that’s the Germans for you. Californians are much more progressive. According to Wikipedia “the first documented nude wedding was celebrated in Elysian Fields, California in 1942.” However, also according to Wikipedia, there is no “Elysian Fields, California”. Accordingly, Calorie Counters of Southern California is a as yet not existant organization, which when Mixie founds it, will list its principal place of business as Elysian Fields, CA. The anticipated corporate slogan is “Cy pres leads the way”. (However, that is so Latin, so she is also considering “Tan lines are for the masses.”)

  • This is the most blatant case of false advertising since my suit against the movie The Neverending Story.

  • WHO CARES>>>>

  • @ Ron Miller:

    You have more faith in the restraint of fellow lawyers to not file frivolous suits than I do. Unlike you, there are a large number of attorneys who are not burdened with cases and clients of colorable merit to occupy their time. So, while you’d see such a suit as wasting valuable time, there are many others who’d see it as a chance to be interviewed on TV or have their name reported in the paper.

  • And 2×4’s aren’t really 2 inches by 4 inches either. Deal with it.

  • I just scrape the “stuff” off and throw it away, dunk the rest.
    BTW, Peter K., the Doublemint marketing insinuates that to “Double Your Pleasure” you have to be a twin.

    P.S. I strongly believe that at least one of the four horsemen will be an attorney.

  • I smell a class action lawsuit brewing, where everyone gets 2.4 lbs of filling, and the lawyers take home 8.6 metric tons.

  • It depends on how much ‘stuf’ is actually in the crème filling. The company may define ‘stuf’ any way they choose. If they have doubled the amount of ‘stuf’, the suit will fail.

  • @Ron

    You mean I shouldn’t an actual example as a reason why it really could happen, cos…..er….its only one example and…um…

    Well hush my mouth. Sorry for pointing out why it can’t just be dismissed as a joke.

  • Just like a 2×4 is 1.5×3.5!!!

  • Everyone will throw tomatoes at me, but: is it really okay for a national company to call a mass-produced, sold-by-weight-and-volume product a double when it is routinely well below that?

    Is there something preventing Oreo from either getting the size of their mass-produced product right, or, failing that, describing it accurately? If I paid only 86% of the price on the box, I’m sure Oreo and the supermarket would be upset, and I’d be prosecuted for shoplifting. But it’s okay when a big corporation does it?

    I know, we’re in a post-modern, post-ironic age in which everyone assumes it’s totally okay for a “double” product to really be an “86% of the way to a double” product, but what if we lived in a world where specific statements of quantity meant something? What’s next, “half off” meaning 33% off? How about “buy 1, get 1 free” where the second one is at 25% price? How about a gallon of milk that’s actually, you know, 3.5 quarts. What’s a little difference here and there? (Quite a lot, when you sell millions of them and the difference is always in your favor.)

    If Oreo had called it “super” or “extra” or, perhaps, “mega,” no one would bat an eye. But “double?” If you don’t want to be held responsible for a “double,” don’t call it that.

  • Possible company response:

    There was actually twice as much by volume at the time of the initial squirting, but that because of squashing during packaging, or settling during shipping (pick one) it just appears to be less when opened.

    OR

    There was twice as much by weight at the of squirting, but the famously dry cookies on either side absorbed the juices creating the difference.

  • I’m at a 6 on the lawsuit potential, personally. Good opportunity to negotiate a worthless remedy for a huge class with a tidy payday for the attorneys though, so maybe make that a 6.5 or a 7.

    I would like to see a bigger sample size though. Also, his math may be assuming all the wafers weigh the same across the styles, which I’m not sure is the case?

  • […] Double Stuf Oreos Don’’ Actually Have Double The Crème […]

  • Max, I like you guts stepping out. Bravo.

    But I disagree simply because the size of the cookies are in plain view and because we are talking about 1.86x here. I think that is close enough.

    Peter, you assume because it happened before with one product that it is a “certainty.” I don’t think this is logical or reasonable and I don’t even think your ideological brothers agree with you.

  • This can’t be!

  • @ Michael W.
    “BTW, Peter K., the Doublemint marketing insinuates that to “Double Your Pleasure” you have to be a twin.

    P.S. I strongly believe that at least one of the four horsemen will be an attorney.”

    Actually, they are 2 sets of twins. All are JD/CPAs, but only 1 of them works for the IRS. None of them like kittens.

  • Was there a lawsuit behind the “uncooked weight when frozen” statement that’s always appended to McDonald’s “Quarter Pounder”?

  • Maybe instead of understuffing the Double Stuffs they’ve been overstuffing the original oreos all these years.

  • […] Says Walter Olson at Overlawyered: [W]ho would like to predict whether some law firm will file an intended class action over this problem within the next twelve months, on a scale where zero indicates “completely confident that there will not be such a lawsuit” and 10 indicates “completely confident that there will be”? […]