Question

Read Case 13-2, Williams vs. Braum Ice Cream Store, Inc., located in your textbook in Chapter 13 on pages 354-355. In this case, the court set forth the two tests used in various jurisdictions to decide whether a breach of warranty of merchantability exists. The court explained both the foreign-natural test and reasonable expectations test. The case arose after the plaintiff broke a tooth on a cherry pit that was in cherry-pecan ice cream.

Read this case carefully, and then respond to the questions posed below.

1. Summarize the relevant facts of the case.
2. What is the conclusion?
3. What is the fundamental difference between the natures of the two tests discussed in this case?
4. Which of the two tests is more likely to yield ambiguous reasoning when applied?

Answer 1

1. Plaintiff Williams purchased a cherry pecan ice cream cone from the defendant’ shop. While eating the ice cream she broke her tooth on a cherry pit and sued the defendant Braum Ice Cream Stores, Inc., for breach of implied warranty of merchantability. The judge ruled in favor of the defendant and the plaintiff appealed.

2. The conclusion was “reasonable expectation”, the better legal theory. The test was applied to an action for breach of implied warranty is keyed to what is “reasonably” fit. It was found that the pit of a cherry should be anticipated in cherry-pecan ice cream and guarded against by the consumer, then the ice cream was reasonably fit under the implied warranty.

3. I think what stands out to me is the difference between what they consider foreign and what they consider to be natural. The reason that the plaintiff won her case was that she was able to show that just because a cherry bit is natural to a cherry does not mean it should be found in her ice cream. Furthermore it can cause a lot of damage to someone even if it is natural to the cherry, as much damage as a say a foreign object like a rock or a pebble.

4. I think the reasonable expectation test would be more likely to yield ambiguous reasoning when applied because in this case it brought to mind that the object found in her ice cream while natural to the cherry was not expected to be there by the plaintiff when she purchased her ice cream. She had a reasonable expectation to purchase her ice cream and walk away from the experience without any harm to her physically.