Activewear giant Lululemon has been hit with a $702,900 penalty after sending more than 370,000 emails that included marketing content but no way for recipients to unsubscribe.

The penalty follows an investigation by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), which found the emails were sent between 1 December 2024 and 5 January 2025. Messages from the brand that were supposed to be simple service updates, such as order confirmations and delivery notifications, also included sales content and links to promotions.

Under Australia’s spam laws, that changes everything.

When a service email becomes a marketing email

ACMA Authority Member Samantha Yorke said the rules around commercial messages are straightforward.

If an email contains any promotional or sales material, it’s considered a marketing message — even if the email also serves another purpose.

“In this case Lululemon sent service emails such as shipping updates that also contained sales material and direct links to promotions,” Yorke said.

“This was an easily avoidable error that has led to hundreds of thousands of marketing emails being sent without a way for people to opt out.”

Why you must include an unsubscribe

Australia’s spam laws require businesses to include a clear unsubscribe option in any marketing message. Yorke said one of the easiest ways for businesses to stay compliant is to keep service emails separate from promotional content.

“Businesses need to understand that marketing messages must have an unsubscribe option and the simplest way to comply is to keep transactional or service messages separate from sales content and links,” she said.

The regulator says this is a mistake businesses continue to make.

“This is the fifth enforcement action the ACMA has undertaken in the last 18 months against businesses that have incorrectly treated messages as non-commercial even though they contained or had links to clearly commercial material.”

Over the past 18 months businesses have paid more than $6.7 million in spam penalties.

Lululemon responds

In addition to the financial penalty, Lululemon has entered into a court-enforceable undertaking requiring it to review its compliance with spam laws and report back to ACMA on improvements.

A spokesperson for Lululemon told Inside Retail the company has already made changes.

“We are committed to delivering an exceptional guest experience that complies with all applicable legal and regulatory requirements,” the spokesperson said. “We take this responsibility very seriously and have worked cooperatively with the ACMA to address their findings.”

The company said it has completed a review of its communication practices and updated its customer emails.

“We have completed a thorough review of our practices for communicating with our guests and have made updates to our standard guest journey emails, including our order confirmation and delivery notifications to ensure ongoing compliance.”

The fine and court ruling is a massive lesson for small business owners who send promotional emails. If there’s any promotional content in the message, even a cheeky sales link tucked into an order confirmation, it counts as marketing. Under the law, that means an unsubscribe button isn’t optional. It’s mandatory.

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