[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 19 (Monday, January 29, 2018)]
[Notices]
[Pages 4048-4050]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2018-01546]


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FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION

[File No. 172 3197]


Bollman Hat Company and SaveAnAmericanJob, LLC, Jointly Doing 
Business as American Made Matters; Analysis To Aid Public Comment

AGENCY: Federal Trade Commission.

ACTION: Proposed consent agreement.

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SUMMARY: The consent agreement in this matter settles alleged 
violations of federal law prohibiting unfair or deceptive acts or 
practices. The attached Analysis to Aid Public Comment describes both 
the allegations in the complaint and the terms of the consent order--
embodied in the consent agreement--that would settle these allegations.

DATES: Comments must be received on or before February 23, 2018.

ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file a comment online or on paper, by 
following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write: ``In the Matter of 
Bollman Hat Company and SaveAnAmericanJob, LLC, jointly d/b/a American 
Made Matters, File No. 172 3197'' on your comment, and file your 
comment online at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/bollmanhatconsent by following the instructions on the web-based form. 
If you prefer to file your comment on paper, write ``In the Matter of 
Bollman Hat Company and SaveAnAmericanJob, LLC, jointly d/b/a American 
Made Matters, File No. 172 3197'' on your comment and on the envelope, 
and mail your comment to the following address: Federal Trade 
Commission, Office of the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite 
CC-5610 (Annex D), Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the 
following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, 
Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW, 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex 
D), Washington, DC 20024.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Julia Solomon Ensor (202-326-2377) and 
Crystal Ostrum (202-326-3405), Bureau of Consumer Protection, 600 
Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20580.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Pursuant to Section 6(f) of the Federal 
Trade Commission Act, 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 2.34, 16 CFR 2.34, 
notice is hereby given that the above-captioned consent agreement 
containing a consent order to cease and desist, having been filed with 
and accepted, subject to final approval, by the Commission, has been 
placed on the public record for a period of thirty (30) days. The 
following Analysis to Aid Public Comment describes the terms of the 
consent agreement, and the allegations in the complaint. An electronic 
copy of the full text of the consent agreement package can be obtained 
from the FTC Home Page (for January 23, 2018), on the World Wide Web, 
at https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/commission-actions.
    You can file a comment online or on paper. For the Commission to 
consider

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your comment, we must receive it on or before February 23, 2018. Write 
``In the Matter of Bollman Hat Company and SaveAnAmericanJob, LLC, 
jointly d/b/a American Made Matters, File No. 172 3197'' on your 
comment. Your comment--including your name and your state--will be 
placed on the public record of this proceeding, including, to the 
extent practicable, on the public Commission website, at https://www.ftc.gov/policy/public-comments.
    Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to 
heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit 
your comments online. To make sure that the Commission considers your 
online comment, you must file it at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/bollmanhatconsent by following the instructions on the web-based 
form. If this Notice appears at http://www.regulations.gov/#!home, you 
also may file a comment through that website.
    If you prefer to file your comment on paper, write ``In the Matter 
of Bollman Hat Company and SaveAnAmericanJob, LLC, jointly d/b/a 
American Made Matters, File No. 172 3197'' on your comment and on the 
envelope, and mail your comment to the following address: Federal Trade 
Commission, Office of the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite 
CC-5610 (Annex D), Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the 
following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, 
Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW, 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex 
D), Washington, DC 20024. If possible, submit your paper comment to the 
Commission by courier or overnight service.
    Because your comment will be placed on the publicly accessible FTC 
website at https://www.ftc.gov, you are solely responsible for making 
sure that your comment does not include any sensitive or confidential 
information. In particular, your comment should not include any 
sensitive personal information, such as your or anyone else's Social 
Security number; date of birth; driver's license number or other state 
identification number, or foreign country equivalent; passport number; 
financial account number; or credit or debit card number. You are also 
solely responsible for making sure that your comment does not include 
any sensitive health information, such as medical records or other 
individually identifiable health information. In addition, your comment 
should not include any ``trade secret or any commercial or financial 
information which . . . is privileged or confidential''--as provided by 
Section 6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 
16 CFR 4.10(a)(2)--including in particular competitively sensitive 
information such as costs, sales statistics, inventories, formulas, 
patterns, devices, manufacturing processes, or customer names.
    Comments containing material for which confidential treatment is 
requested must be filed in paper form, must be clearly labeled 
``Confidential,'' and must comply with FTC Rule 4.9(c). In particular, 
the written request for confidential treatment that accompanies the 
comment must include the factual and legal basis for the request, and 
must identify the specific portions of the comment to be withheld from 
the public record. See FTC Rule 4.9(c). Your comment will be kept 
confidential only if the General Counsel grants your request in 
accordance with the law and the public interest. Once your comment has 
been posted on the public FTC website--as legally required by FTC Rule 
4.9(b)--we cannot redact or remove your comment from the FTC website, 
unless you submit a confidentiality request that meets the requirements 
for such treatment under FTC Rule 4.9(c), and the General Counsel 
grants that request.
    Visit the FTC website at http://www.ftc.gov to read this Notice and 
the news release describing it. The FTC Act and other laws that the 
Commission administers permit the collection of public comments to 
consider and use in this proceeding, as appropriate. The Commission 
will consider all timely and responsive public comments that it 
receives on or before February 23, 2018. For information on the 
Commission's privacy policy, including routine uses permitted by the 
Privacy Act, see https://www.ftc.gov/site-information/privacy-policy.

Analysis of Proposed Consent Order To Aid Public Comment

    The Federal Trade Commission (``FTC'' or ``Commission'') has 
accepted, subject to final approval, an agreement containing a consent 
order from Bollman Hat Company and SaveAnAmericanJob, LLC, jointly d/b/
a American Made Matters (``respondents'').
    The proposed consent order has been placed on the public record for 
thirty (30) days for receipt of comments by interested persons. 
Comments received during this period will become part of the public 
record. After thirty (30) days, the Commission will again review the 
agreement and the comments received, and will decide whether it should 
withdraw from the agreement or make final the agreement's proposed 
order.
    This matter involves respondents' marketing, sale, and distribution 
of hats with claims that the products are of U.S.-origin, and 
respondents' marketing, sale, and distribution of memberships in their 
``American Made Matters'' (``AMM'') program to companies wishing to 
make U.S.-origin claims for their products.
    According to the FTC's complaint, respondents represented that 
their products are ``Made in USA.'' In fact, many of the respondents' 
hats are wholly imported, and others contain significant imported 
content. Therefore, this representation was false or misleading.
    The complaint further alleges that the AMM seal represents by 
implication that respondents' products have been endorsed or certified 
by an independent third party. AMM, however, is a fictitious name for 
respondents, who created the AMM seal and use it in connection with the 
sale of their own products. Therefore, these representations were false 
or misleading.
    The complaint next alleges that respondents made implied claims 
that products and entities using their AMM seal were independently and 
objectively evaluated for compliance with respondents' certification 
standard. These claims were false or misleading.
    Finally, the complaint alleges that respondents claimed that all 
AMM members sell products that are all or virtually all made in the 
United States. Because respondents awarded the AMM certification to any 
company that self-certified that at least 50% of the cost of one of 
their products was incurred in the United States, with final assembly 
or transformation in the United States, this claim was false or 
misleading, or unsubstantiated at the time it was made.
    Based on the foregoing, the complaint alleges that respondents 
engaged in deceptive acts or practices in violation of Section 5(a) of 
the FTC Act.
    The proposed consent order contains provisions designed to prevent 
respondents from engaging in similar acts and practices in the future. 
Consistent with the FTC's Enforcement Policy Statement on U.S. Origin 
Claims, Part I prohibits respondents from making U.S.-origin claims for 
their products unless either: (1) The final assembly or processing of 
the product occurs in the United States, all significant processing 
that goes into the product occurs in the United States, and all or 
virtually all ingredients or components of the product are made and 
sourced in the United States; or (2)

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a clear and conspicuous qualification appears immediately adjacent to 
the representation that accurately conveys the extent to which the 
product contains foreign parts, ingredients or components, and/or 
processing.
    Part II prohibits respondents from making any representation about 
any user or endorser of any product, package, certification, service, 
practice, or program, unless respondents disclose clearly and 
conspicuously any material connection between a user or endorser and 
(1) respondents or (2) any other individual or entity affiliated with 
the product or service.
    Part III prohibits respondents from representing, expressly or by 
implication, that a product or service meets respondents' certification 
standard, unless: (1) An entity with no material connection to that 
covered entity conducted an independent and objective evaluation to 
confirm that the certification standard was met; or (2) respondents' 
certification and marketing materials disclose clearly and 
conspicuously that the certification standard may be met through self-
certification.
    Part IV prohibits respondents from making any country-of-origin 
claim about a product or service unless the claim is true, not 
misleading, and respondents have a reasonable basis substantiating the 
representation. In the alternative, for country-of-origin 
representations made through AMM marketing materials, respondents may 
make such claims if (1) they neither know or have reason to know that 
the self-certification is misleading, and (2) disclose clearly and 
prominently that products or services meet the certification standard 
through self-certification.
    Part V prohibits respondents from providing third parties with the 
means and instrumentalities to make the claims prohibited in Parts I, 
III, or IV.
    Parts VI through IX are reporting and compliance provisions. Part 
VI requires respondents to acknowledge receipt of the order, to provide 
a copy of the order to certain current and future principals, officers, 
directors, and employees, and to obtain an acknowledgement from each 
such person that they have received a copy of the order. Part VII 
requires the filing of compliance reports within one year after the 
order becomes final and within 14 days of any change that would affect 
compliance with the order. Part VIII requires respondents to maintain 
certain records, including records necessary to demonstrate compliance 
with the order. Part IX requires respondents to submit additional 
compliance reports when requested by the Commission and to permit the 
Commission or its representatives to interview respondents' personnel.
    Finally, Part X is a ``sunset'' provision, terminating the order 
after twenty (20) years, with certain exceptions.
    The purpose of this analysis is to aid public comment on the 
proposed order. It is not intended to constitute an official 
interpretation of the proposed order or to modify its terms in any way.

    By direction of the Commission.
Donald S. Clark,
Secretary.
[FR Doc. 2018-01546 Filed 1-26-18; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 6750-01-P