For Immediate Release
January 18, 2007
POM Wonderful Halts Animal Testing!
Animal Activists Declare Victory as Pomegranate Juice Maker Halts Cruel Experiments
In a letter to retailers on Wednesday, POM Wonderful executives stated they would stop cruel and unnecessary animal testing on their products, effective immediately. Coming less than 24 hours after Whole Foods Markets threatened to pull POM products off the shelves April 1st if animal testing was not stopped, the move was an unmitigated victory for animal activists who have been protesting POM Wonderful executives and owners Stewart and Lyda Resnick for months.
“POM Wonderful pomegranate juice has ceased all animal testing and we have no plans to do so in the future,” Lynda and Stewart Resnick, owners of POM parent company Roll International, wrote to all POM retailers by e-mail or post on Wednesday. Ironically, only last Saturday, company owner Stewart Resnick exited his Beverly Hills mansion and yelled at activists protesting there: “I don’t care if you protest me for 45 years – I will never stop testing on animals!”
After being exposed last year as funding cruel and unnecessary animal experiments, in which baby mice were deprived of oxygen and rabbits had their penile arteries severed, POM has seen legal demonstrations at the homes of its executives and owners in Los Angeles as well as a recent claim alleging product tampering on the East Coast, where an anonymous communique to the North American Animal Liberation Press Office stated that 487 bottles of POM juice had been tainted with some kind of gastrointestinal irritant. Wild Oats grocers pulled the product off their shelves at that time. (full communique at here)
The National Advertising Division (NAD) of the Better Business Bureau has recommended POM Wonderful discontinue its “puffery” and hyperbolic health claims regarding its pomegranate juice. NAD Director Andrea Levine reported that the claims were the strongest she’d ever seen for a food product, yet POM continues to make outrageous claims that its juice benefits cancer, heart disease, and Alzheimer’s disease.
As detailed in a company press release last month, POM vice-president Fiona Possell resigned her position as company spokesperson, acknowledging animal rights activists as the reason for her resignation. The North American Animal Liberation Press Office is currently seeking a written statement from POM Wonderful detailing their promise to stop testing on animals, either in-house or through the continued use of outside facilities such as UCLA.