Rihanna’s Savage x Fenty brand condemned for its restrictive subscription system

Rihanna is never close to controversy. You may have already noticed it if you’ve logged into the e-shop of Rihanna Savage x Fenty’s underwear brand: The tempting VIP offers actually come with a price. In addition to beautiful lingerie offered in a wide range of sizes and presented on models of a wide variety of morphologies and origins, Savage x Fenty offers to pay less for each piece provided you join its VIP program which is nothing more than a relatively restrictive membership system, if you want it to stay free.

What the Savage x Fenty VIP program is all about, that binding not-so-free membership

In summary, this VIP program allows you to benefit from advantages and reductions on condition that you subscribe to its subscription system: you can buy at a reduced price, or decide to switch to your shift, which remains free if you do well. shares his decision explicitly on the site between the 1st and 5th day of each month. Otherwise, on the 6th day you will be charged €49.95, an amount that is credited to your Savage x Fenty account and which you can spend at any time, until you decide to cancel your subscription. So it’s not a theft, but rather a way to retain its particularly sneaky, not to mention aggressive, clientele.

All of this is clearly explained on each product page, with a clickable link for further explanation. But note however that when faced with an item, we instinctively click quickly on the “add to VIP cart” button instead of “add to standard cart” (especially since the latter is not colored like the previous one, which makes it relatively less visible, as well as being placed further down) without necessarily reading the short lines describing what the subscription entails.

Savage x Fenty by Rihanna, condemned for its restrictive subscription system

This presentation is about the French eshop and this system is legal in France until proven otherwise. But the online store is different in the US and hasn’t always been so explicit. As reported The East Bay Times on November 28, 2022 the counties of Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Los Angeles and San Diego, as well as the city of Santa Monica, therefore charged Lavender Lingerie LLC (the company responsible for the Savage x Fenty brand) to have deceive customers. Santa Clara County Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Deng told the outlet:

“Consumers have the right to know in advance how much they are paying and how often. Businesses have a duty to be transparent about auto-renewal fees. »

Following that complaint, a lawsuit found that Savage x Fenty failed to obtain consent from affected customers, clearly disclose the terms of its automatic renewal program, or offer an easy way to stop the charges. The judicial proceeding has even highlighted that the credit pocketed by the brand through the VIP membership that is used every month could only be spent for a higher amount. For example, if you had €50 in your Savage x Fenty customer account because you forgot to “spend your month” between the 1st and 5th month, you could only spend that amount on an order over €50.

A $1.2 million fine, plus restitution and investigation costs

Faced with all these constraints that strongly encourage consumption, the brand was then fined $1.2 million, and will also pay $150,000 in compensation to former VIP members and those who are still VIP members in California, plus $50,000 state investigation fees.

The Santa Clara District Attorney’s Office reports that Savage x Fenty cooperated and changed their website for greater transparency, added an alert system that notifies you of automatic subscription renewals, and made it less of a burden to spend credit.

As the media report The GrayCalifornia state law requires e-shops to highlight auto-renewal rates. In July 2022, new state legislation went into effect requiring automatic subscriptions to be simple to cancel and for online retailers to clearly signal the end of free trial periods.

Photo Attribute: Savage x Fenty Instagram screenshot.