Zodiac’s $3.5M Pool Products Antitrust Settlement Approved

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On Monday, a Louisiana federal judge granted preliminary approval to a $3.45 million pool products antitrust settlement by Zodiac Pool Systems Inc. that will provide benefits to a Class of direct purchasers who were affected by the company’s allegedly anticompetitive conduct.

The pool products antitrust class action lawsuits were filed in the wake of a November 2011 announcement by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) that it had conducted an antitrust investigation into the country’s three largest manufacturers of pool products: Hayward Industries Inc., Pentair Water Pool and Spa Inc., and Zodiac Pool Systems Inc.

The plaintiffs alleged that the Hayward, Pentair and Zodiac conspired with the distributor Pool Corp. to restrict the sale of pool products to the distributor’s competitors. Pool Corp. is the largest distributor of products used for swimming pool construction and maintenance. In 2012, the pool products antitrust lawsuits were consolidated into multidistrict litigation titled In re: Pool Products Distribution Market Antitrust Litigation.

U.S. District Judge Sarah S. Vance approved the Zodiac class action settlement after finding “no reason to doubt the fairness of the process by which the parties arrived at a settlement agreement.” The terms of Zodiac’s pool products antitrust settlement are nearly identical to a deal reached in June by Hayward. The Hayward deal was preliminarily approved in September.

Class Members of the pool products antitrust class action settlement include: “All persons and entities located in the United States that purchased Pool Products in the United States directly from PoolCorp, during the Class Period from November 22, 2007 to November 21, 2011.”

After costs and expenses are paid, the amount remaining from the $3.45 million settlement fund will be distributed on a pro rata basis to Class Members who submit valid and timely claims.

In addition to the $3.45 million settlement with direct purchasers, Zodiac has also agreed to pay $500,000 to settle indirect purchaser claims. However, a hearing for the indirect purchaser class action settlement is not scheduled until March 2015.

Zodiac also agreed to assist the plaintiffs with document authentication and answering questions about transactional data that was previously produced by Hayward during discovery.

The direct purchasers are represented by Russ M. Herman, Leonard A. Davis and Adam H. Weintraub of Herman Herman & Katz LLC; Robert N. Kaplan, Gregory K. Arenson and Elana Katcher of Kaplan Fox & Kilsheimer LLP; Ronald J. Aranoff, Dana Statsky Smith and Tania T. Taveras of Bernstein Liebhard LLP; and Jay L. Himes and Robin A. van der Meulen of Labaton Sucharow LLP.

The indirect purchasers are represented by Thomas J.H. Brill of the Law Office of Thomas H. Brill, Gerald E. Meunier of Gainsburgh Benjamin David Meunier & Warshauer LLC, John F. Edgar of Edgar Law Firm LLC, Isaac L. Diel of Sharp McQueen PA and Michael Brady of Brady & Associates.

The Zodiac Pool Products Antitrust Class Action Lawsuit is In re: Pool Products Distribution Market Antitrust Litigation, Case No. 2:12-md-02328, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

UPDATE: Instructions on how to file a claim for the pool products indirect purchaser class action settlement are now available! Click here or visit www.PoolProductsConsumerLawsuit.com for details.

UPDATE 2: Top Class Actions viewers who filed a claim for the pool products price-fixing class action settlement started receiving checks in the mail.