Loyola Consumer Law Review
Volume 10 | Issue 4

Article 6

1999

Courts Split as to Whether Consumers Injured by
Hot Coffee Can Seek Recovery
Zachary Rami

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Recommended Citation
Zachary Rami Courts Split as to Whether Consumers Injured by Hot Coffee Can Seek Recovery, 10 Loy. Consumer L. Rev. 310 (1998).
Available at: http://lawecommons.luc.edu/lclr/vol10/iss4/6

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CASE
NOTES
Courts split as to whether consumers injured by hot coffee can seek recovery by Zachary Rami

Common sense, coffee and consumers clashed recently in
McMahon v. Bunn-O-Matic,l wherein the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals held that a coffee maker manufacturer did not have a duty to warn consumers that its coffee would be served at 180 degrees, and that the coffee maker was not defectively designed. The decision, which affirmed a lower court's entry of summary judgment in favor of the coffee maker manufacturer, is consistent with a majority of courts, which have held in recent years that such claims leave no issue of material fact for trial.' However, not every jurisdiction has routinely dismissed these "coffee" cases. In fact, McMahon referred to Nadel v. Burger King,3 which held that a products liability claim for excessively hot coffee was appropriate for a jury to decide.
This Note will discuss the facts and procedural history of McMahon, as well as the Seventh Circuit's ruling on the duty to warn and defectiveness of the product's design. This note will next examine the Ohio Court of Appeals' contrasting decision in Nadel. This comparison will