SUBPART D. FALSE ADVERTISING

§411. Advertisements, untrue or misleading, prohibited; penalty

A. No person, with intent to sell or in any way dispose of merchandise, securities, service, or anything directly or indirectly, to the public for sale or distribution, or with intent to increase the consumption, or to induce the public in any manner to enter into any obligation relating thereto, or to acquire title, or an interest therein, shall make, publish, disseminate, circulate, or place before the public, or cause directly or indirectly to be made, published, disseminated, circulated, or placed before the public, in this state, in a newspaper or other publication, or in the form of a book, notice, hand-bill, poster, bill, circular, pamphlet, or letter, or radio broadcasts, telecasts, wire, wireless, motion picture, or in any other way, an advertisement of any sort regarding merchandise, securities, service, or anything offered to the public, which advertisement contains any assertion, representation, or statement of fact which is untrue, deceptive, or misleading.

B. No person shall falsely advertise, represent, or hold out that any sale of goods, wares, or merchandise is an insurance, salvage, removal, closing out, going out of business, liquidation or smoke, fire, or water damage sale. Such a sale may be conducted for a maximum of six months. No person contemplating such a sale may order any goods for the purpose of selling them at such a sale, and any purchases or additions to the stock during the term of the sale or within sixty days prior to the sale shall constitute a violation of this Section.

C. No person shall advertise, represent, or hold out that he is selling or will sell any goods, wares, or merchandise at wholesale prices, unless he is a wholesaler, as defined herein, and unless the sales will be wholesale sales, as defined herein. A wholesaler, for purposes of this Section, is a person whose sales are wholesale sales as hereinafter defined. A wholesale sale is a sale for the purpose of resale in the ordinary course of business or a sale for purposes other than resale but at the price at which retailers currently purchase the same or similar goods or commodities at current wholesale prices offered by a bona fide wholesale house in its trade area; however, nothing herein shall apply to wholesalers selling in bulk or in quantities in excess of those which consumers usually purchase from bona fide retail outlets. Nothing in this Section shall prevent a person from being both a wholesaler and a retailer, providing that under this operation the firm has both a retail and a wholesale occupational license.

D. The carriage by a radio or television broadcast station or by a cable television station or newspaper of advertising which is found to be in violation of this Section shall not be considered a violation by the broadcast or television station or newspaper of this Section.

E. Whoever violates this Section shall be fined not less than five hundred dollars nor more than twenty-five hundred dollars or imprisoned for not less than ten days nor more than six months, or both for each offense.

Amended by Acts 1956, No. 293, §1; Acts 1964, No. 246, §1; Acts 2004, No. 364, §1.