A flower company has admitted to running 156 websites with different suburb names and placing thousands of Google ads that would have misled customers into thinking they were ordering from a flower shop in their local area, in a proposed $1m settlement with the Australian consumer regulator.
If Ashgrove residents searched for an online flower delivery service, Meg’s Flowers would come up with a photo of a shopfront, a banner stating “Ashgrove florist” and text reading “finest quality flowers in Ashgrove” along with a Queensland phone number.
However, Meg’s Flowers did not have a shopfront in Ashgrove. The website was just one of 156 sites and more than 7,400 Google ads put in place by Flowercorp, the Meg’s Flowers parent company, to appear to be based in the towns people were searching for flowers, between January 2019 and February 2022.
“Meg’s Flowers did not directly maintain any local shopfronts accessible to customers,” a statement of agreed facts submitted to the federal court in June states.
“Orders received by Meg’s Flowers could be fulfilled from premises owned or leased by other members of the Flowercorp group… The same Flowercorp group staff fulfilled orders for different Flowercorp brands.”
Other Flowercorp brands include Roses Only and Sarah’s Flowers. The orders were fulfilled from one of 11 premises run by Meg’s Flowers, or a sub-contractor.
In a joint submission to the federal court, Meg’s Flowers has admitted the practice was misleading or deceptive, or likely to mislead or deceive, and that the company made false or misleading representations in connection with the supply of delivered flowers concerning the place of origin of goods in contravention of Australian consumer law.
“In each case, the representation was misleading, because flowers ordered from Meg’s Flowers did not originate from a florist located in the town, suburb or locality referred to in the advertisement, because there are no Meg’s Flowers premises or third party florists located within the relevant town, suburb or locality,” the joint submission states.
The ACCC fielded 66 complaints about Meg’s Flowers in the period, including 11 from customers stating they wanted to support local businesses.
The statement of agreed facts states that directors responsible for marketing the brand had overall responsibility for the failures that led to the contraventions. After the ACCC first issued statutory notices to the company in March 2022, the websites were updated to state where the delivery for each location was coming from.
The company has agreed to pay a penalty totalling $1m for the practice, and has suggested to the court that each website run by the company could have a corrective notice placed on it. A hearing was held by the federal court to determine whether to accept the proposed fine last week. Justice Berna Collier reserved her decision.
Flowercorp reported a net profit of $3.1m in the 2021-22 financial year, while Meg’s Flowers reported a net profit of $44,555.
Meg’s Flowers is not the first to be targeted by the regulator. In 2022, United Florists made an undertaking to the ACCC over a similar practice related to 1,500 websites and Google ads for 1,000 suburbs across Australia.
