Setting the manufacturer's recommended retail price (UVP) against the retailer's own, lower selling price is one of the most popular advertising tools in online retail: the retailer's own offer price is well below the crossed-out UVP – often presented as the price last charged – and signals a bargain to the customer at a glance.
UVP advertising is attractive but not without legal pitfalls. Accordingly, it repeatedly occupies the courts.
As the Wettbewerbszentrale (Centre for the Protection of Fair Trading) recently announced, the Regional Court (LG) Würzburg considers advertising with a recommended retail price (UVP) for own-brand products to be misleading where these are offered exclusively within a single group of companies (judgment of 17 July 2026, Case No. 14 O 1180/25, not yet final). For goods that are available from only a single supplier, there is no market on which a UVP could be based. The recommendation is then no longer a guide but merely embellishes the retailer's own price and is therefore, according to the LG Würzburg, misleading.
For retailers with their own brands or exclusively distributed brands in their range, this is a warning sign – but no reason to bury UVP advertising altogether. As so often, it depends on the specific scenario.
The Key Points in Brief
- UVP advertising is not impermissible per se – it can be permissible provided the price recommendation can actually serve as a guide to the market price and the advertising is not misleading.
- UVP advertising can be misleading in particular where the price recommendation was not seriously calculated as a reasonable consumer price, is no longer current or offers no market-appropriate guidance. The latter may be the case, for example, with own brands, sole distribution or certain special models.
- In doing so, the LG Würzburg applies a line of case law of the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) that has been settled for more than 20 years to online retail.
- Even if technically identical goods are also sold elsewhere, the specific brand or product designation may still be available exclusively from one retailer.
- In addition to misleading advertising under § 5 UWG, a second question arises in the case of UVP crossed-out price advertising: does it also require the 30-day best price to be stated under § 11 PAngV? This is disputed in the courts and is pending before the BGH.
The Facts of the Case before the LG Würzburg
Whether UVP advertising is permissible depends on the details of the individual case – here, they were clear-cut.
A furniture retailer advertised products from its own-brand range with a UVP and compared it with a significantly lower offer price. The special feature: this furniture was available exclusively within a single group of companies. It was therefore not a matter of goods traded freely on the market but of an exclusive range distributed within the group. The Wettbewerbszentrale saw this as misleading, sent a cease-and-desist letter and sued – successfully.
The Decision
The court prohibited the advertising as misleading (§ 5 UWG). The central idea: without a market, there is no guidance.
The misleading element lies in the fact that consumers understand a UVP as a guide to the usual price level. If the price actually charged is significantly below it, the offer appears particularly good value. That expectation, however, comes to nothing where the specific goods in question are available from only one supplier at all. There is then no market with several retailers on which the price recommendation could serve as a benchmark for comparison. What remains is a comparison figure that makes the retailer's own selling price look particularly attractive.
Noteworthy – and particularly important in practice – is how the court dealt with the objection that identical products were also available from other suppliers. That changed nothing, the chamber held, because those products were offered there under different designations. Consumers orient themselves by the specific brand or product designation under which they buy – not by whether technically identical goods are available elsewhere under a different name. Anyone who creates exclusivity through a specific brand therefore cannot rely on the argument that, "in essence", a freely traded mass-market item lies behind the product.
The BGH's Line of Case Law on Sole Distribution
The LG Würzburg is thus not breaking new ground. The BGH has already held, with regard to sole distribution, that a UVP cannot provide a proper guide to the market price where there is no market with several retailers to which the price recommendation is addressed (BGH, judgment of 28 June 2001, Case No. I ZR 121/99).
The LG Cologne transferred this reasoning to own brands in online retail in 2016: anyone who distributes an own brand exclusively themselves and at the same time advertises with a "UVP" that they undercut creates a comparison price that cannot stand the test of an independent market (LG Cologne, judgment of 13 January 2016, Case No. 84 O 174/15).
The LG Würzburg now follows this line as well. On this basis, it is not sufficient that technically identical products are available from other retailers under other names. What is decisive is the specific product advertised, under its particular brand or designation. If this is available only within a closed distribution system, there is still no market on which the UVP could serve consumers as genuine guidance.
When UVP Advertising Remains Permitted under § 5 UWG – and When It Does Not
UVP advertising in connection with § 5 UWG is a recurring topic in the case law. What matters is whether the UVP actually provides a meaningful guide to consumers' price expectations. Where that function is lacking, the advertising may be misleading.
Not least, the Higher Regional Court (OLG) Cologne held permissible the comparison, in the case before it, of a selling price with a manufacturer's recommendation expressly designated as a "UVP". In the court's view, consumers understand the UVP as a recommendation by the manufacturer and not as the retailer's own earlier selling price. In the OLG's view, the advertising therefore also did not constitute an announcement of a price reduction within the meaning of § 11 para. 1 PAngV (OLG Cologne, judgment of 15 May 2026 – 6 U 92/25).
When the Courts Held UVP Advertising to Be Impermissible
- Advertising is impermissible where the stated UVP no longer exists at the time of the advertising. In the Amazon case, a watch was set against a crossed-out manufacturer's price although the manufacturer had already abandoned that price recommendation. The BGH saw this as misleading. Consumers may assume that a UVP stated without any further indication is currently valid (BGH, judgment of 3 March 2016 – I ZR 110/15 – "Herstellerpreisempfehlung bei Amazon").
This case is also of particular interest because the erroneous UVP came from the platform itself – you can read why retailers are nevertheless liable in our article on liability for competition law infringements by platform operators.
- The specific products in question were available only within a group of companies. The court did not regard it as sufficient that technically identical or identically constructed products were sold by other retailers under different designations. For the specific goods advertised, there was therefore no market on which the UVP could serve as genuine guidance. The advertising was prohibited as misleading (LG Würzburg, judgment of 17 July 2026 – 14 O 1180/25).
Amazon and Würzburg concern different scenarios – the outdated UVP in the one, the lack of a market reference in the other. What both have in common, however, is the central idea: a UVP may serve as a yardstick for comparison only if it actually provides guidance at the time of the advertising.
Advertising therefore becomes impermissible in particular where precisely this guidance function is merely feigned – for example because the UVP is no longer current, does not represent a seriously calculated consumer price, or because no corresponding market exists at all for the specific goods in question.
UVP as the 30-Day Best Price under § 11 PAngV?
Anyone who concludes from the Würzburg judgment that UVP advertising is unproblematic outside the own-brand scenario takes too narrow a view. After all, a second debate, under price indication law, runs in parallel to the question of misleading advertising under § 5 UWG – and it is currently anything but settled.
The point of dispute is whether a UVP comparison that additionally advertises with a crossed-out UVP and a percentage saving is to be understood as an announcement of a price reduction within the meaning of § 11 PAngV. If so, the retailer would additionally have to state the lowest price of the last 30 days. The lower courts are split: one group (among them the OLG Stuttgart and the OLG Cologne) sees in a clearly labelled UVP a mere comparison with the recommendation of a third party and denies the obligation. Another group (among them the OLG Düsseldorf and the LG Frankfurt am Main) considers it applicable – depending on the overall design of the advertising. The BGH will resolve the question (pending under Case No. I ZR 80/25).
In practice, this means that UVP advertising which clears the misleading-advertising hurdle of § 5 UWG without difficulty may nevertheless be open to challenge under the PAngV – with an outcome that is currently open. Particular caution is required as soon as prominent percentage figures come into play.
What requirements § 11 PAngV imposes on crossed-out prices, percentage figures and reference prices is something we have set out in detail in our article on current case law on advertising with price reductions.
What Online Retailers Should Check Now
A sober review is worthwhile for retailers with an own-brand or exclusive range:
- Is the advertised brand exclusive? If the specific goods in question are distributed only through the retailer's own shop or its own group of companies, the UVP comparison is misleading according to the line taken by the LG Würzburg. After Würzburg, pointing to identically built goods under a different name does not help.
- Is the UVP genuine and current? A seriously calculated, valid manufacturer's recommendation is a basic prerequisite – and must be proven in the event of a dispute.
- How prominent is the percentage saving? Where dominant discount percentages are advertised alongside the UVP, restraint is advisable until the BGH rules.
- Is there a clean alternative? Referring to a genuine earlier price of one's own remains possible – but then under the rules of § 11 PAngV and not mixed up with the UVP system.
Conversely, anyone who observes such advertising by a competitor has, in the Würzburg line, a robust basis for examining and enforcing claims for injunctive relief.
Conversely, anyone who observes such advertising by a competitor has, in the Würzburg line, a robust basis for examining claims for injunctive relief and – where urgent – enforcing them by way of a preliminary injunction.
Note: The judgment is a first-instance decision and not yet final. It derives its weight less from itself than from the settled BGH case law that it confirms. For online retailers, however, the message is clear: for own brands and exclusively distributed goods, classic UVP crossed-out price advertising carries a concrete risk of cease-and-desist letters – and the open PAngV question comes on top as a second risk where percentage discounts are advertised.
