Water bottles manufactured by the company Contigo called AUTOSPOUT Straw Gizmo Flip, AUTOSPOUT Straw Gizmo Sip, AUTOSPOUT Straw Striker, and the larger Ashland water bottle are all at risk of growing mold deep inside the mouthpiece where it is unable to be cleaned out. This mold is often invisible, unreachable, and occurring in bottles used by young children. Contigo’s negligent design poses risk to all of their consumers drinking from bottles with these rubber straws.
Contigo has dealt with its share of legal issues, having been sued and recalled a line of water bottles for another defective design; one that was allowing the rubber mouthpiece on children’s bottles to fall off into their mouths and creating a serious choking hazard. On August 27th, 2019, after the company had reportedly received 149 reports, the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission announced that Contigo had recalled their line of “Kids Cleanable Water Bottles.” They had sold 5.7 million units of the defective product, and received notice that 18 spouts were found inside of young children’s mouths.
A class action lawsuit filed on August 29th, 2019 against Ignite USA, the manufacturer of Contigo, stated that the recall was insufficient compensation for consumers who had purchased the defective product. The basis for this claim is that “hundreds of thousands—if not millions” of consumers who had purchased these models of bottles were not made aware of the safety risk, nor of the fact that the products had been recalled, and that this was done intentionally to minimize the number of purchasers who would make a claim.
Because of Ignite USA and Contigo’s negligence in properly handling this issue, their silence on the issue of mold growing in unreachable areas of their AutoSpout mouthpieces comes as no surprise. Users claim that after decent use, the mouthpieces develop black mold growth in areas that are invisible when looking at the bottle. The only way to view and reach this mold to clean is to completely disassemble the bottle, thus damaging it permanently and rendering it unusable. Users of these bottles have good reason to fear that, after using them for some time, and unbeknownst to them, they are ingesting mold. This is a defective design that Contigo must take full responsibility for.
If you have found mold growing in the mouthpiece of your Contigo bottle, you may be entitled to compensation. Contact the skilled defective product lawyers at the Keefe Law Firm today via phone call, or by filling out the form on this page.
