A recent Legal Intelligencer story, “Shop-Vac Class Settlement to Net $4.25M in Attorney Fees,” reports that a federal judge's preliminary approval of a settlement in the Shop-Vac marketing and sales practices litigation has paved the way for $4.25 million in attorney fees for four firms representing the plaintiffs.

According to U.S. District Judge Yvette Kane of the Middle District of Pennsylvania's memorandum, the ­defendants, Shop-Vac Corp. and Lowe's Home Centers Inc., have agreed not to oppose the firms' request for fees.  The four firms are Faruqi & Faruqi, Lax LLP, Lite DePalma Greenberg and Milberg LLP.

The attorney fees are separate from the class settlement, which provided for an extension of the Shop-Vac warranty and changes to how the company refers to "peak horsepower" and tank capacity in its marketing.

The class action was brought by five plaintiffs claiming that Shop-Vac was ­misleading consumers about its wet/dry vacuums, further alleging that the company exaggerated about the amount of horsepower the vacuums generated as well as how much dust and debris the units could hold.

"Under plaintiffs' tests, Shop-Vac wet/dry vacuums were only able to generate a small fraction of the represented horsepower," the complaint said.  "In addition, under plaintiffs' tests, the vacuums' tank capacity was only an average of 64 percent as large as advertised."

"Plaintiffs' counsel describes having ­reviewed 22,000 pages of defendants' documents, taking and defending multiple depositions and consulting with several experts," Kane said.  "Thus, the court is persuaded that the proposed settlement agreement arose out of 'serious, informed, noncollusive negotiations.'"

Kane said she was also satisfied that the agreement had no "obvious deficiencies" and falls "within the range of possible approval."  The range of possible approval is determined by measuring the plaintiffs' expected recovery against the value of the settlement offer, according to a 2014 Eastern District of Pennsylvania decision in the NFL concussion litigation.

Along with the warranty extension and the changes to promotional materials, the agreement also provides plaintiffs' counsel the ability to submit an application to award the plaintiffs up to $5,000 each.

"In light of the risks faced by plaintiffs in continuing litigation and the benefits provided under the proposed settlement agreement, the court finds that the proposed settlement agreement falls within the range of possible approval for purposes of ­preliminary approval.  The parties estimate the retail value of the extended warranties amount 'well into the millions of dollars,'" Kane said.

She added, "Furthermore, proposed monetary awards to plaintiffs represent incentive awards, which are permissible in class ­action litigation and appear reasonable at this stage."