*1 On May 26, 2021, Plaintiff Pictsweet Company (“Pictsweet”) and Defendant CRF Frozen Foods, LLC (“CRF”) participated in a discovery teleconference concerning the parties' previously filed joint discovery dispute statement. (Docket No. 135.) In dispute was the sufficiency of Pictsweet's responses to numerous interrogatories and requests for production (“RFP”) propounded by CRF. The Court resolved all of the discovery requests in dispute during the teleconference except for one – Interrogatory No. 39 – for which the Court directed the parties to file a supplemental joint discovery dispute statement containing the parties' respective arguments regarding Pictsweet's substantive objections to the interrogatory in question. (Docket No. 138 at 2.) Now pending before the Court is the parties' supplemental joint discovery dispute statement (Docket No. No. 140), which was filed as a motion and to that extent is GRANTED.

Interrogatory No. 39 asks Pictsweet to “identify any and all customers for Plaintiff from 2000 to present including the dates that the customer began and ended business transactions with Plaintiff.” (Docket No. 135-4 at 6.) Pictsweet objects to the interrogatory as “vague and ambiguous, overly broad in scope, unduly burdensome, and seeking information that is not relevant to the claims or defenses of any party[.]” (Docket No. 140 at 2.)[1] Pictsweet also claims that the information sought through this interrogatory is already available to CRF by way of previously produced financial documents showing monthly and yearly sales data by customer and product. Pictsweet additionally argues that interrogatory “lacks proportionality to the needs of the case” and would improperly require Pictsweet to reveal proprietary and/or confidential business information. (Id.)

CRF counters that the information it seeks is perfectly reasonable in light of the broad scope of discovery permitted under federal law. CRF notes that the information bears directly on Pictsweet's allegation of “tarnished” reputation caused by CRF's issuance of the 2016 recall at the heart of this litigation. CRF also asserts that the Confidentiality and Protective Order currently governing the discovery process in this matter (Docket No. 94) is sufficient to prevent the disclosure of any proprietary information.

Rule 26 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended in 2015, permits discovery of information that is “relevant to any party's claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1). The rule delineates certain considerations in determining proportionality: (1) the importance of the issues at stake, (2) the amount in controversy, (3) the parties' relative access to relevant information, (4) the parties' resources, (5) the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues, and (6) whether the burden of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit. Id. Although the scope of discovery is traditionally quite broad, the trial court may limit discovery in a manner that is not inconsistent with Rule 26. See Coleman v. Am. Red Cross, 23 F.3d 1091, 1096 (6th Cir. 1994) (“[I]t is well established that the scope of discovery is within the sound discretion of the trial court.”) (internal citation omitted).

*2 Notably, the parties confirm that CRF already has in its possession the names of all Pictsweet's customers from 2013 to the present. (Docket No. 140 at 2, 6.) CRF does not directly challenge Pictsweet's limiting of the timeframe to 2013 forward, instead claiming that the information it currently seeks through Interrogatory No. 39 is “the date each customer during the relevant period began and ended its business transactions with Pictsweet.” (Id. at 6.) Therefore, the only question for the Court is whether CRF is entitled to discover the start and end dates of any business relationships existing between Pictsweet and a customer from 2013 to the present.

In determining confidentiality within the meaning of Rule 26, courts may consider if the particular discovery request seeks the “type[ ] of information ... generally viewed as trade secrets or confidential information ... such as product formulas, marketing plans, or information relating to marketing decisions.” Allen v. Howmedica Leibinger, GmhH, 190 F.R.D. 518, 526 (W.D. Tenn. 1999) (internal citation omitted). Interrogatory No. 39 asks for the names of customers – which is information already disclosed by Pictsweet – as well as the duration of their respective business relationships with Pictsweet. The Court need not decide whether the customer relationship, including duration is a confidential information or a trade secret, because Pictsweet has already disclosed the basic customer information, presumably subject to whatever discovery confidentiality constraints are already in place. If these customers continued purchasing products from Pictsweet following the recall, or if new customers began purchasing products from Pictsweet after the recall, such evidence could be used to rebut Pictsweet's repeated claim of “damages and injury to [its] good reputation ... resulting in lost sales.” (Second Amended Complaint, Docket No. 104 at ¶¶ 112, 134, 143, 152, 187, 200, 237, 252.) The interrogatory thus seeks information that is relevant for purposes of Rule 26. See Universal Delaware, Inc. v. Comidata Network, Inc., No. 3:10-MC-00104, 2011 WL 1085180, at *6 (M.D. Tenn. Mar. 21, 2011) (compelling disclosure of the names and identities of a competitor's customers following finding that such information was central to subject defendant's position in lawsuit).

The question remains whether such information is proportional to the needs of the case. Two of the factors considered in this analysis – the importance of the issues and the amount in controversy – weigh in favor of disclosure given that Pictsweet has claimed $27 million in lost sales based in part on purported damage to its reputation due to a recall affecting the health and welfare of the general public. (Docket No. 135 at 22.) Additionally, and as discussed above, the information sought here could enable CRF to refute Pictsweet's argument if no customer relationships were impacted by the 2016 recall, thus favoring disclosure based on the “importance of the discovery in resolving the issues at stake” factor, which is especially germane to the Court's consideration. See Brown v. Tax Ease Lien Servicing, LLC, No. 3:15-cv-208-CRS, 2016 WL 10788070, at *8 (W.D. Ky. Oct. 11, 2016) (noting that the Rule 26 proportionality analysis “turns on how central the proposed discovery is to the ... defense to which it relates[.]”) (internal citation omitted).

*3 The Court further finds that the parties' respective resources are of limited significance to the current dispute. The pleadings and motions filed to date indicate that both parties have little trouble financing litigation. This consideration is thus neutral.

The final two considerations – the parties' relative access to the information and whether the burden of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit – are interrelated in the current dispute. Pictsweet argues that Interrogatory No. 39 imposes an “undue burden” in part because it seeks information that has already been provided to CRF, namely financial documents demonstrating Pictsweet's “sales trends for each customer.” (Docket No. 140 at 3.) This argument is somewhat undermined by the haphazard way in which Pictweet has responded to discovery to date, which has included inadequate labeling of documents and refusal to verify responses under oath in compliance with Rule 33(b)(3) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Moreover, CRF asserts that Pictsweet's production of “aggregated customer data” fails to answer the question of whether the 2016 recall caused actual harm to Pictsweet's reputation (id. at 5), which could at least arguably be measured by identifying any changes to Pictsweet's customer base following the recall. The Court thus finds that the “parties' relative access” factor generally favors disclosure of the information as requested.

Finally, the Court turns to the issue of whether the burden of the discovery request outweighs its likely benefit. Pictsweet emphasizes that CRF should be forced to “shoulder [the] burden” of locating information that is already available to it via previously produced financial documents. (Id. at 3.) CRF provides little argument other than a general claim that Pictsweet has failed to meet its burden to prove why the requested discovery is unduly burdensome. (Id. at 6.) For the reasons previously discussed, the Court concludes that the information sought by CRF would provide a reasonable gauge of the impact the subject recall caused to Pictsweet's reputation and brand, thus outweighing the burden to Pictsweet in this matter. Accordingly, the Court finds that, on balance, Rule 26 favors disclosure of the information sought by CRF via Interrogatory No. 39.

Nevertheless, the Court agrees with Pictsweet that being forced to identify the dates that all of its relevant business relationships began and ended – 3,746 by Pictsweet's count – constitutes an undue burden that can be alleviated by limiting the scope of Pictsweet's response. The Court also finds that the precise date on which relationships that existed prior to the recall began is of limited probative value given that, according to CRF's own briefing, the pertinent issues are whether existing customers (which can be identified through discovery already provided) continued purchasing from Pictsweet following the recall, and whether new customers began purchasing from Pictsweet following the recall. The Court therefore exercises its inherent authority to tailor the subject discovery request to fit the needs of the case. Burrell v. Duhon, No. 518CV00141TBRLLK, 2019 WL 5260481, at *8 (W.D. Ky. Oct. 17, 2019).

Accordingly, Pictsweet's response to Interrogatory No. 39, which must be provided by Friday, June 18, 2021, shall be limited to the following information: (1) the names of any customers who transacted business with Pictsweet before the subject 2016 recall but ceased transacting business with Pictsweet following the subject recall, including the date of the customer's last business transaction with Pictsweet and (2) the names of any customers who began transacting business with Pictsweet following the subject recall, including the date of the customer's first business transaction with Pictsweet.[2]

*4 It is SO ORDERED.