New Balance Shoes has been hit with a $2.3 million dollar lawsuit filed because of what the plaintiffs called false and misleading ads. The three women who began the suit, Kimberly Carey, Victoria Molinarolo and Shannon Dilbeck will be awarded the sum of five thousands dollar each to satisfy their portion of the suit while others involved in the class action part of the lawsuit will be given a refund for shoes they have purchased. That refund should equal around one hundred dollars.

New Balance introduced their line of shoes including the TrueBalance and the Rock& Tone shoes in 2010. The ads for those models claimed that that wearing the shoes "activated" muscles in the lower body. Those ads also stated that the soles were designed to make it harder for the wearer to stay balanced, much like walking in sand. New Balance's ads also claimed that wearing the shoes burned up to eight percent more calories than not wearing them.

But, scientists found that there was no evidence of any of those claims, including the increased calorie burn. In addition, a number of sports physiology experts expressed serious concern about the heightened risk of injury for these shoes and similar brands, a fact that was omitted from all of the ads and literature that accompanied shoe sales.

The shoes sold well, accounting for more than $252 million from January to April 2010. New Balance sold only $17 million worth of shoes for all of its lines in 2008. So far, there has been no sanctions leveled by the Federal Trade Commission in relation to the New Balance shoes involved in the lawsuit. The FTC has levied huge fines on a number of other companies that sell fitness shoes including Skechers and Reebok. Skechers was forced to pay more than forty million dollars in fines and refunds because of their Shape Up shoes while Reebok was hit with a twenty five million dollar fine for their Easy Tone shoes. Like the New Balance shoes, both brands failed to prove that their shoes met the claims that they made in their ads. In addition, new ads for the shoes will be free from the scientific, weight loss claims completely. Skechers relied on one doctor's opinion for their previous ads without revealing that he was married to a company marketing executive and that he had been hired to provide his opinion. That information was also not disclosed in advertisements.