In two recent closing letters, the Federal Trade Commission called out marketers for using hashtags that communicated false U.S.-origin claims. It's an important reminder that the hashtags advertisers choose to use in their social media posts may communicate "made in USA" and other claims that require substantiation, just like any other elements of a company's advertising.
According to the FTC's Enforcement Policy Statement on U.S. Origin Claims, in order to make an unqualified "made in USA" claim about a product, the advertiser must be able to substantiate that the product was "all or virtually all" made in the United States. This means that the final assembly or processing of the product must take place in the United States and that product should contain only a negligible amount of foreign content. In order to make a determination about whether a product was made here, the FTC also considers other factors, including the portion of the product's total manufacturing costs that are attributable to U.S parts and processing and how far removed from the finished product any foreign content is. The FTC's "made in USA" policy was also recently codified in a Made in USA Labeling Rule, which applies to U.S. origin claims made in product labeling (which includes catalogs and websites as well).
Lorts Manufacturing
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