ROBERT B. KUGLER, District Judge.
GNC is a global health and wellness products retailer. See Def. Br. at 3. This action arises from GNC's Gold Card Program which afforded benefits to customers for repeatedly shopping at GNC. See Pl. Br. at 1; Compl. GNC has made various changes to this program since its inception in 1991. See Def. Br. at 1. Register purchased a membership loyalty Gold Card ("Card") from GNC in 2015, and renewed it in March 2016. See Pl. Br. at 1-2. In December 2016, GNC "restructur[ed]" its Card program, eliminating membership pricing and Card benefits. Def. Br. at 1. Register brings a breach of contract claim on behalf of a nationwide class as a result of this cancellation. Id. Register also brings a New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act, N.J.S.A. § 56:8-1 ("CFA"), claim on behalf of a New Jersey subclass. See Compl.
The Card itself is gold and was provided to Register at purchase.
Federal law determines whether a forum selection clause is enforceable. 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a). Forum selection clauses are "prima facie valid and should be enforced unless enforcement is shown by the resisting party to be unreasonable under the circumstances." M/S Bremen v. Zapata Off-Shore Co., 407 U.S. 1, 10 (1972) (internal quotations omitted). In the Third Circuit, a forum selection clause is generally valid unless: (1) it is the result of fraud or overreach; (2) enforcement would violate strong public policy of the forum; or (3) enforcement would, under the particular circumstances, result in litigation in a jurisdiction so seriously inconvenient as to be unreasonable. Coastal Steel Corp. v. Tilghman Wheelabrator Ltd., 709 F.2d 190, 202 (3d Cir. 1983) (citing M/S Bremen, 407 U.S. at 10) overruled on other grounds Lauro Lines s.r.l. v. Chasser, 490 U.S. 495 (1989).
The forum selection clause at issue is reasonable. Register, rather than argue the merits under the three-factor test, asserts that because GNC did not give him the terms and conditions before he bought the Card membership, those terms and conditions are invalid. Register used the Card. This Card contained a URL to GNC's website where the terms and conditions were readily available. He renewed his membership after using the card—thus, he unambiguously had the terms and conditions before he bought the disputed second membership term.
As such, this Court moves on to the three factor test. First, this clause was not agreed to through fraudulent means—Register has introduced no evidence of any type of fraud. Second, while the parties did not specifically bargain over this clause and an assessment by this Court of the equity of the bargaining power in this relationship would be speculative at this time, we can presume that there was appropriate consideration in the form of a lower price for the venue selection clause. Hodes v. S.N.C. Achille Lauro, 858 F.2d 905, 913 (3d. Cir. 1988) (upholding a forum selection clause requiring consumers to assert their claims in Italy because the Court allowed a presumption that the clause resulted in a lower price for the good). Third, the Western District of Pennsylvania would likely be more convenient for the parties on balance. Besides the deference this Court must give to the parties' contractual choice, GNC is located there so witnesses and documents will be more readily available—this Court is aware that discovery will, should this case proceed beyond GNC's Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) challenge in the transferee forum, likely be quite one-sided.
For the foregoing reasons, GNC's motion to transfer is hereby