[DO NOT PUBLISH]

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

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No. 16-16726

Non-Argument Calendar

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D.C. Docket No. 1:16-cv-20851-MGC

JOAQUIN LORENZO, 

on Behalf of Himself and All Others Similarly Situated, 

 Plaintiff - Appellant,

versus

MILLERCOORS, LLC, 

MOLSON COORS BREWING COMPANY, 

SABMILLER PLC, 

 Defendants - Appellees.

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Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Florida

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(July 31, 2017)

Before MARCUS, JORDAN, and FAY, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

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Joaquin Lorenzo sued the defendants for unjust enrichment, claiming he 

overpaid for Coors Light beer on the false pretense that the defendants brewed the 

beer exclusively in Colorado using Rocky Mountain spring water. The defendants 

each moved to dismiss on both jurisdictional (subject-matter and personal) and 

non-jurisdictional grounds. MillerCoors, LLC additionally asked the district court 

to take judicial notice of an exhibit purporting to depict the current packaging of 

Coors Light.

The district court summarily granted the motions and request for judicial 

notice. Mr. Lorenzo now appeals that decision. Following a review of the record 

and the parties’ briefs, we reverse because the district court failed to explain 

whether it was dismissing the complaint on jurisdictional or non-jurisdictional 

grounds.

I

Because we write for the parties, we assume their familiarity with the record 

and only set forth what is necessary for our decision. At this stage in the 

proceedings, we accept Mr. Lorenzo’s factual allegations as true and view the facts 

in the light most favorable to his complaint. See, e.g., Am. United Life Ins. Co. v. 

Martinez, 480 F.3d 1043, 1057 (11th Cir. 2007).

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A

Mr. Lorenzo says he purchased Coors Light beer at a premium price because 

he believed that it was brewed exclusively in the Rocky Mountains and made with 

Rocky Mountain spring water. See Compl. at 8 ¶ 22. He alleges that specific 

advertisements with statements such as “Proudly Brewed in our Rocky Mountain 

Tradition,” “When the Mountains Turn Blue It’s as Cold as the Rockies,” “What 

Would We Be Without Our Mountains,” “Our Mountain is Brewing the World’s 

Most Refreshing Beer,” and “Born in the Rockies” led him and other reasonable 

consumers to develop this belief. See id. at 4 ¶ 17, 7 ¶ 20. He also generally 

alleges that other unidentified “[a]dvertisements throughout the years have touted 

the Coors brand of beers as being ‘brewed with pure Rocky Mountain spring 

water.’” Id. at 2 ¶ 9.

It turns out, however, that although some batches of Coors Light are brewed 

in Golden, Colorado, at the base of the Rockies, others are “brewed in various 

breweries located throughout the United States.” Id. at 7 ¶ 21. Similarly, Coors 

Light allegedly is not actually made using “pure Rocky Mountain spring water.” 

Id. at 7 ¶ 21.

So Mr. Lorenzo filed this state-law unjust-enrichment action in Florida state 

court against the defendants for false advertisement. Id. at 8 ¶ 23. Claiming to 

have brought this action on behalf of himself and other similarly situated 

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consumers, Mr. Lorenzo seeks, among other things, restitution and disgorgement 

from the defendants as well as an injunction ordering them to engage in a 

corrective advertising campaign. See id. at 10–11.

B

The defendants removed the case to federal district court, and each of them 

then filed motions to dismiss the complaint. SABMiller and Molson Coors moved 

to dismiss the complaint for lack of personal jurisdiction and for failure to state a 

claim. See D.E. 9 (SABMiller); D.E. 10 (Molson Coors). MillerCoors moved to 

dismiss for failure to state a claim, and also requested that the district court take

judicial notice of a composite exhibit it filed in support of its motion to dismiss. 

See D.E. 11; D.E. 12.

The district court set the motions for a hearing. A day before the hearing, 

MillerCoors filed a notice of supplemental authority directing the district court to a 

decision by another district judge within the same district dismissing a similar 

lawsuit for lack of Article III standing on the ground that the plaintiffs had not 

established that they were injured because they did not specifically allege that the 

particular coconut water beverage they purchased (instead of just some batches of 

that beverage) “came from somewhere other than Brazil,” D.E. 43-1 at 3, which 

was the advertised source of the drink and the premise of the plaintiffs’ falseadvertising claim.

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At the hearing, the defendants argued that Mr. Lorenzo had not established 

Article III standing because he failed to allege “that the Coors Light that [he] 

purchased was not brewed in Colorado.” D.E. 47 at 6. The defendants also argued 

that the complaint failed to state an unjust enrichment claim because it did not 

contain an allegation that there “was anything wrong with the Coors Light . . . [Mr. 

Lorenzo] purchased”—such as explaining how it was “different from other beer 

brewed in Golden, Colorado”—that made “it inequitable for MillerCoors to retain 

the money that [he] paid for it.” Id. at 7.

As we will explain shortly, the district court orally granted the motions to 

dismiss, but did not adequately provide the basis for its decision. It also granted 

the request for judicial notice without any explanation. The next day, the district 

court issued a written order summarily granting the same motions, dismissing the 

complaint without prejudice, and directing the clerk to close the case (which would 

have required Mr. Lorenzo to re-file a complaint, as opposed to merely filing an 

amended complaint). This appeal followed.

II

The district court’s reason for dismissing Mr. Lorenzo’s complaint is 

unclear. Although it heard the defendants’ jurisdictional arguments and 

acknowledged that “jurisdiction is always on the table,” D.E. 47 at 13, the district 

court never expressly ruled that it had subject-matter jurisdiction or personal 

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jurisdiction. And without both, it was powerless to proceed to the merits. See 

Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Env’t, 523 U.S. 83, 101–02 (1998) (subject-matter 

jurisdiction); Employers Reinsurance Corp. v. Bryant, 299 U.S. 374, 382 (1937)

(personal jurisdiction). The district court, moreover, made several 

pronouncements that confounded its basis for dismissal.

The district court first ruled that there was nothing in the complaint “that 

would lead a reasonable defendant to think that [Mr. Lorenzo] [had] established a 

cause of action of drinking [the defendants’] beer” and that “show[ed] that the beer 

[Mr. Lorenzo specifically] drank was not . . . brewed with mountain water.” D.E. 

47 at 13. On its face, this seems to be a merits-based decision that Mr. Lorenzo’s 

complaint failed to state (or, as the district court put it, “establish[ ]”) a cause of 

action. But, given the defendants’ argument that there was no Article III standing 

because the complaint failed to affirmatively allege that the particular Coors Light 

beer Mr. Lorenzo bought was not brewed in Colorado or not made with pure 

Rocky Mountain spring water, it could also be read as the district court’s 

conclusion that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction.

The district court’s “second[ ],” id., reason for dismissing the complaint is 

equally unclear. The district court concluded that “nothing in [the defendants’] ad 

campaign . . . [represented] that [Coors Light] beer was exclusively brewed with 

mountain water,” id., and that merely saying that the beer was “born in the 

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mountains” “would [not] lead [a] reasonable consumer to think [it] is only brewed 

from one place ever.” Id. at 14. Again, this seems to be a ruling on the merits. 

But if it is, then that would mean the first basis was not on the merits, unless we 

are to read the two potentially merits-based reasons as alternative.

Moreover, neither the first reason nor the second reason expressly touched 

upon the subject-matter jurisdiction and personal jurisdiction arguments raised by 

one or more of the defendants. And at no point during the hearing did the district 

court explain why it granted the request to take judicial notice of the composite 

exhibits purporting to depict the complete carton in which Coors Light beer is 

packaged, which MillerCoors offered to show that a reasonable consumer would 

not have been misled about where the beer is brewed because the package 

allegedly states that the company’s “applies its cold-stage brewing process 

throughout the country.” D.E. 11 at 9–10.

III

The old adage is that we can affirm a district court’s decision on “any 

ground supported by the record.” Bircoll v. Miami-Dade Cty., 480 F.3d 1072, 

1088 n.21 (11th Cir. 2007). That is true, but the part that is often overlooked is 

that our decision to do so is discretionary. When potentially challenging questions

are passed on in silence, we have remanded cases to the district court for it to 

articulate its reasoning. See, e.g., Mosley v. Ogden Marine, Inc., 480 F.2d 1226, 

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1226 (5th Cir. 1973) (remanding case to the trial court “for entry of reasons in 

support of the granting of appellees’ motion for summary judgment”). This is 

because, when thorny issues are in play, a reasoned order is necessary for us to 

“proper[ly] perform[ ] . . . [our] review function.” Clay v. Equifax, Inc., 762 F.2d 

952, 957 (11th Cir. 1985) (collecting cases from the former Fifth Circuit and the 

Supreme Court in which an order has been vacated and remanded for want of 

reasoning).

“[T]he paramount concern in determining whether to remand [a case] for 

entry of an order susceptible of better review is judicial economy.” Id. at 958. In 

this case, a more reasoned order would further that interest.

For starters, the various grounds for dismissal raised by the defendants 

warrant different standards of review. See, e.g., McElmurray v. Consol. Gov’t of 

Augusta-Richmond Cty., 501 F.3d 1244, 1251 (11th Cir. 2007) (subject-matter 

jurisdiction); Stubbs v. Wyndham Nassau Resort & Crystal Palace Casino, 447 

F.3d 1357, 1360 (11th Cir. 2006) (personal jurisdiction); Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 

U.S. 662, 677–78 (2009) (failure to state a claim). Some, such as personal 

jurisdiction, may even require the district court to allow the plaintiff to present 

evidence. See Stubbs, 447 F.3d at 1360.

The arguments raised are also categorically different from one another. The 

defendants have challenged the merits of Mr. Lorenzo’s complaint, as well as the 

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district court’s subject-matter and personal jurisdiction. These distinct bases for 

dismissal potentially present decision-sequencing problems. See Florida Wildlife 

Fed'n Inc. v. United States Army Corps of Engineers, No. 14-13392, 2017 WL

2622333, at *12–18 (11th Cir. Jun. 19, 2017) (Tjoflat, J., concurring) 

(summarizing Supreme Court precedent on a district court’s discretion to choose 

between merits and jurisdictional grounds for dismissal, as well as competing 

nonmerits jurisdictional grounds). The sequencing of the decision, in turn, raises 

questions about the preclusive effect, if any, of the district court’s order. See, e.g., 

Estevez v. Nabers, 219 F.2d 321, 323 (5th Cir. 1955) (dismissal for failure to 

establish Article III standing precludes re-litigation of standing issue unless facts 

have changed; but if a second court has jurisdiction, it is not precluded from 

adjudicating merits).

In light of these concerns, we think that remanding this case to the district 

court for a reasoned decision, as opposed to speculatively going through 

contingencies, best serves judicial economy.

REVERSED AND REMANDED WITH INSTRUCTION.

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