spectre

On November 1, 2011, K&N Engineering prevailed in a lawsuit for false advertising and unfair competition against Spectre Performance, pending in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. K&N is the inventor of cotton gauze high-flow air filters and continues to manufacture its products in Riverside, California. Spectre is an importer of Chinese-made cotton fiber and cotton gauze air filters similar in appearance to K&N’s air filters.

After a jury trial that included seven days of testimony by 14 witnesses, and the introduction of hundreds of exhibits, the jury reached a unanimous verdict that Spectre had intentionally engaged in various forms of false advertising and awarded K&N $7.3 million in compensation against Spectre.

The jury found that Spectre had intentionally made false claims regarding its air filters and air intake systems, including false claims about the filtration, fuel savings, air flow, and horsepower capabilities of its air filters and air intake systems as well as false claims that certain of its intake systems were approved by the California Air Resource Board (CARB) when they were not. On the other hand, as to Spectre’s claims against K&N alleging it falsely advertised the horsepower capabilities of its air intake systems, the jury unanimously found in favor of K&N that its advertising was not false.

In a statement released following the trial, Steven Rogers, CEO of K&N, stated he was “pleased with the outcome of the trial which should bring a final end to Spectre’s making false claims designed to influence consumers with misinformation dressed in the guise of tests that were not reliable, were not performed, or were not representative of the actual characteristics of Spectre’s products. It has been a two-year battle to right this wrong and we are fortunate to have the U.S. legal system to fall back on when all else fails.”

SoCal SAYS: You build a reputation over years of hard work and you can destroy it with one bad action. Unfortunately for Spectre, they built their reputation on a foundation of things that were not true, which will really hurt their brand. For K&N, this will only strengthen their reputation in the lifted truck industry as a quality innovator. We’re glad K&N fought for the truth and won.