In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Nos. 22-3268 and 23-1022 

F.C. BLOXOM COMPANY, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v.

TOM LANGE COMPANY INTERNATIONAL, INC., doing business 

as SEVEN SEAS FRUIT,

Defendant-Appellee. 

F.C. BLOXOM COMPANY, doing business as F.C. BLOXOM 

INTERNATIONAL, 

Petitioner-Appellant, 

v.

JASON LAYE,

Respondent-Appellee. 

____________________ 

Appeals from the United States District Court for the 

Central District of Illinois. 

Nos. 3:20-cv-3147 & 3:22-mc-03005 — Sue E. Myerscough, Judge. 

___________________

ARGUED OCTOBER 30, 2023 — DECIDED JULY 25, 2024 

____________________ 
2 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

Before EASTERBROOK, RIPPLE, and SCUDDER, Circuit Judges. 

SCUDDER, Circuit Judge. This appeal presents a dispute 

under the Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act, a 

Depression-era statute that regulates the market for fresh 

fruits and vegetables. Seven Seas Fruit initiated 

administrative proceedings against F.C. Bloxom Company 

under the Act when Bloxom refused to pay for three loads of 

onions. The Secretary of Agriculture found for Seven Seas, 

and Bloxom exercised its statutory right to what the Act calls 

a “trial de novo” in federal district court. Agreeing with the 

findings of the Secretary, the district court entered summary 

judgment for Seven Seas. Bloxom challenges that ruling on 

appeal. Seeing no reversible error, we affirm.

I 

A 

F.C. Bloxom Company is a Seattle-based distributor, importer, and exporter of fresh produce. The company does not 

itself grow fruits or vegetables but instead acquires them from 

suppliers for resale to customers in the domestic and international markets.

In August 2018, Bloxom’s Brian Bernard received a call 

from a customer in Honduras seeking to import U.S. No. 1 

grade onions. Bernard tapped his colleague Alejandro Hernandez to help fill the order. Hernandez reached out to Seven 

Seas salesman Jason Laye to see if Seven Seas could supply 

the onions. Seven Seas agreed to do so, and the two sides hammered out a deal. Their agreement required Seven Seas to deliver three loads of onions to the Port of Long Beach in California, for transport via an oceangoing container ship—the 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 3

MSC Channe—that was slated to set sail for Honduras on August 14. 

In the course of the parties’ negotiations, one item seemed 

to go overlooked. Honduras, like most countries, requires 

shipments of fruits and vegetables to undergo inspection for 

plant-borne pests and diseases before it will allow them to enter the country. These inspections must be conducted in the 

produce’s country of origin by a designated authority, most 

often a government agency. Only if that entity issues a socalled phytosanitary certificate declaring the inspected produce safe for export will Honduran customs officials let it into 

the country. In Bloxom’s case, this meant that each load of onions had to be inspected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture before they left the Port of Long Beach.

At no point during the contract negotiations did the parties expressly discuss the phytosanitary certificates. Bloxom’s 

Brian Bernard nonetheless came to believe that Seven Seas’ 

Jason Laye would procure the certificates. Laye not only had 

procured certificates for previous sales, but also, during the 

negotiations of this new transaction, offered vague assurances 

that that if Bernard secured space for the onions on the MSC 

Channe, he would “take care of the rest.” 

Bloxom claims to have had a second reason to believe that 

Laye would procure the certificates. It insists that it emailed 

purchase orders to Laye that explicitly stated that the certificates would be “provided by Seven Seas.” The purchase orders further specified that Seven Seas would fax Bloxom copies of those certificates “before” the onions were loaded onto 

the MSC Channe.
4 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

But there was a gap, and that gap proved consequential. 

Seven Seas resolutely denied receiving these purchase orders 

or otherwise agreeing to procure the certificates. And at no 

point has Bloxom supplied concrete proof that they were sent. 

In the days following their negotiations, neither party 

arranged for a phytosanitary inspection, leaving the onions to 

arrive at the Port of Long Beach without the certificates 

necessary to clear Honduran customs. Even then, though, the 

Department of Agriculture could have performed an 

inspection at the port itself. But Bloxom believed that the 

phytosanitary certificates were in place, despite Seven Seas’ 

failure to fax copies as the purchase orders required. So, on 

August 13, Bloxom took no action as the onions were loaded 

onto the MSC Channe. They set sail for Honduras the next 

day—uninspected and indeed now uninspectable.

Reality dawned slowly. It was not until the onions approached Honduras that Bloxom began asking about the certificates. On August 23, and again on August 27, Bernard 

asked Laye for a copy of “the phyto” for each load of onions. 

Laye responded that “[t]he shipper is FedEx directly to Honduras.” Bernard apparently took this to mean that the phytosanitary certificates had been procured by the company that 

grew the onions and that this third-party would FedEx them 

directly to Bloxom’s customer in Honduras. On this understanding, Bernard asked Laye to “have them send [him] a 

copy via email.” No email followed.

Pressure mounted once the onions arrived in Honduras. 

On September 1, Bernard informed Laye that Bloxom’s customer could not “get the containers of onions” out of the port 

because it “never got the phytos.” Bernard asked Laye 

whether he had “a scan” of the certificates that he could send 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 5

him and stressed that he “really need[ed] it ASAP.” Laye replied that he “emailed the shipper and requested” copies. On 

September 4, Bernard texted Laye that “[t]he Honduras customer [was] all over [him]” and pleaded with him to “work 

on the Phytos as soon as possible tomorrow morning.” That 

evening Laye informed Bernard of the worst possible news: 

no phytosanitary inspection had taken place. Now Bloxom 

had a major problem on its hands, for there was no way to 

obtain phytosanitary certificates in Honduras and, consequently, no way to deliver the onions to the buyer. 

To salvage the situation, Bloxom and Seven Seas began 

brainstorming alternative outlets for the onions. On September 9, Bernard raised the possibility of selling them to customers in Trinadad or the Dominican Republic. But these efforts 

did not pan out, and the onions remained in quarantine in 

Honduras. After much consternation, Bloxom had no choice 

but to ship the onions back to the United States.

Jason Laye proposed shipping the onions to Jacksonville, 

Florida, where Seven Seas had contacts that might be willing 

to acquire them. Bloxom agreed to the proposal, and the onions took to sea a second time.

The onions arrived in Jacksonville on December 18, 2018. 

But the return shipping company would not release the onions until freight charges totaling $21,135 were paid. For several weeks, Bloxom and Seven Seas could not agree on which 

company should bear those expenses. And as long as the fees 

went unpaid, the onions could not be inspected for quality, 

let alone resold. So the onions sat.

Eventually Bloxom and Seven Seas resolved the disagreement. In a letter agreement, which Bloxom signed on 
6 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

February 5, 2019, Seven Seas agreed to pay the $21,135 shipping fee “on behalf of Bloxom Company ... in order to facilitate release of the Onions.” The parties also formalized the 

terms of the consignment arrangement they had worked out 

in principle before. Bloxom expressly agreed to release the onions to Seven Seas as Bloxom’s consignee. As consignee, 

Seven Seas agreed to “perform an inspection” and, should 

they be found “salvageable/marketable,” to “place the Onions 

for Bloxom Company’s account.” The letter agreement made 

clear that although Seven Seas would take physical possession of the onions, “at no time [would] ownership transfer 

from Bloxom Company to Seven Seas.”

Once Seven Seas paid the return shipping fee, Bloxom released the onions for inspection. Only then did it become clear 

that the onions had spoiled. So Seven Seas had them destroyed.

B 

This suit arose from Seven Seas’ efforts to exact full 

payment for the onions at the agreed-upon price. When 

Bloxom refused to pay—citing Seven Seas’ failure to procure 

the certificates—Seven Seas commenced administrative 

proceedings against Bloxom under the Perishable 

Agricultural Commodities Act. 

Congress enacted that statute to combat “unfair and 

fraudulent practices” in the interstate market for highly perishable agricultural commodities like fresh fruits and vegetables. Pub. L. 71–325. To further that objective, the Act created 

a federal cause of action against regulated entities (like 

Bloxom and Seven Seas) that engage in any one of a number 

of unfair trade practices. See 7 U.S.C. § 499e(b) (creating cause 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 7

of action); id. § 499b(1)–(7) (enumerating unfair trade practices). Injured persons can file a lawsuit directly in state or 

federal court. See id. § 499e(b). But they can also seek reparations in proceedings before the U.S. Department of Agriculture. See id. 

Seven Seas elected the administrative path. It sought relief 

from Bloxom under § 499b(4), which makes it an unfair trade 

practice to, among other things, “fail or refuse ... [to] make 

full payment promptly in respect of any transaction in any 

[covered] commodity to the person with whom such transaction is had.” Bloxom counterclaimed, seeking damages for 

Seven Seas’ failure to procure the phytosanitary certificates. 

The Secretary of Agriculture ultimately found in favor of 

Seven Seas. Its reasoning was straightforward. Seven Seas denied receiving the purchase orders, and Bloxom, for its part, 

was unable to prove that they had been sent. This proved fatal 

to Bloxom’s position because the company had not come forward with evidence that the duty to procure certificates was 

otherwise delegated to Seven Seas during the negotiations. 

Without evidence of such delegation, Bloxom could not get 

out of its contractual obligation to pay for the onions at the 

contract price and was not entitled to damages on its counterclaim.

The Secretary made another finding that would prove important to subsequent litigation and, indeed, to this appeal: 

breach or no breach, Bloxom “accepted the subject loads of 

onions” at the Port of Long Beach despite Seven Seas’ failure 

to fax it copies of the phytosanitary certificates “prior to loading” as the purchase orders required. 
8 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

C 

Bloxom appealed the Secretary’s ruling to federal district 

court. See id. § 499g(c). The term “appeal” here is a bit of a 

misnomer. The Act states that a party that appeals an administrative reparation order to a federal district court is entitled 

to “a trial de novo” that “shall proceed in all respects like 

other civil suits for damages.” Id. The only difference between 

the path Bloxom chose and an original suit for damages under 

§ 499e(b) is that “the findings of fact and order or orders of 

the Secretary” serve as “prima-facie evidence of the facts 

therein stated.” Id. § 499g(c). This simply means that “the facts 

found by the Secretary shall stand as the established facts until sufficient evidence is produced on the trial to overcome 

them.” Farris v. Meyer Schuman Co., 115 F.2d 577, 579 (7th Cir. 

1940); see also Frito-Lay, Inc. v. Willoughby, 863 F.2d 1029, 

1032–33 (D.C. Cir. 1988). 

The district court set an initial discovery deadline of September 30, 2021. From the outset, the focus of discovery was 

on the purchase orders and, to a lesser extent, on evidence 

that might show that, during the contract negotiations, 

Bloxom delegated the duty to procure phytosanitary certificates to Seven Seas. 

It quickly became apparent that more time would be 

needed. The district court demonstrated considerable patience and three times extended the discovery deadline. 

As the litigation dragged on, the relationship between the 

parties grew increasingly acrimonious. Bloxom came to believe that Seven Seas and Jason Laye were withholding information critical to its theory of the case. And Seven Seas grew 

increasingly frustrated with the scope of Bloxom’s discovery 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 9

requests, which it felt was not commensurate with the litigation’s modest financial stakes. Amid that fractious backdrop, 

Seven Seas filed an early motion for summary judgment. 

Although three months of discovery remained, Seven Seas 

urged the district court to bring the litigation to a close. Its 

principal reason for that outcome had to do with the purchase 

orders. After years of litigation and ample discovery, Bloxom 

remained unable to point to any evidence proving that it sent 

Seven Seas the purchase orders. Nor could Bloxom point to 

evidence showing the company delegated to Seven Seas an 

obligation to obtain the phytosanitary certificates during the 

negotiations themselves. 

Seven Seas saw an early award of summary judgment as 

warranted for a second reason. Even assuming the company 

breached a duty to procure phytosanitary certificates, Bloxom 

could not prevail because it accepted the onions at the Port of 

Long Beach under Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code 

without then ever later revoking that acceptance. 

Bloxom responded to Seven Seas’ summary judgment 

motion by filing a floodtide of discovery requests. For good 

measure, Bloxom filed a motion to compel against Laye in a 

federal district court in Florida, where Laye lived. See Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 45(d)(2)(B)(i). (That action was later transferred to the 

Central District of Illinois and assigned to the same judge 

handling Bloxom’s appeal from the Secretary’s decision.) 

Believing these efforts to be futile, Seven Seas sought a stay of 

all discovery. As it saw things, nothing could change two 

bottom-line realities: Bloxom never sent Seven Seas purchase 

orders evidencing the certificate requirement, and even if 

such an obligation did exist, Bloxom had waived the 

requirement by taking possession of the onions at the Port of 
10 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

Long Beach and shipping them to Honduras without any 

certificates in hand.

Bloxom disagreed and pleaded for more time under 

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(d), which “permits a 

district court to delay consideration of a summary judgment 

motion and order additional discovery before ruling if the 

non-movant demonstrates that ‘it cannot present facts 

essential to justify its opposition.’” Sterk v. Redbox Automated 

Retail, LLC, 770 F.3d 618, 627–28 (7th Cir. 2014) (quoting Fed. 

R. Civ. P. 56(d)). Bloxom supported that request with sworn 

declarations explaining why it needed yet more time for 

discovery and what kinds of information it expected 

additional discovery to uncover.

The district court did not rule on Seven Seas’ requested 

stay or on Bloxom’s motion under Rule 56(d), so discovery 

proceeded apace. In the closing weeks of discovery, Bloxom’s 

flurry of discovery activity became an avalanche. In rapid succession, Bloxom filed a motion seeking permission to take 

more than ten depositions, a motion seeking additional time 

to depose Alejandro Hernandez (who no longer worked at 

Bloxom), and two motions to compel. And with just four days 

remaining in discovery, Bloxom filed a renewed Rule 56(d) 

motion, moved for a fourth extension of the discovery deadline, and sought leave to supplement its brief opposing summary judgment. The district court permitted Bloxom to supplement its opposition brief but did not otherwise act on these 

requests.

And in the end, it never did. On November 22, 2022, 

months after the close of discovery, the district court entered 

summary judgment against Bloxom on both of the grounds 

urged by Seven Seas. See F.C. Bloxom Co. v. Tom Lange Co. Int’l, 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 11

Inc., 642 F. Supp. 3d 775 (C.D. Ill. 2022). It determined that no 

reasonable trier of fact could find that Bloxom had delegated 

the task of procuring phytosanitary certificates to Seven Seas. 

See id. at 783. It also concluded that Seven Seas was entitled 

to summary judgment under the Uniform Commercial Code. 

Breach or no breach, the record conclusively established “that 

Bloxom accepted the onions, did not reject the onions at the 

Port of Long Beach, [and] [n]ever revoked [that] acceptance.” 

Id. at 787. Because none of the discovery sought by Bloxom 

would have altered these conclusions, the district court denied all requests for more discovery. Id. at 786. 

The district court entered final judgment soon thereafter—

in both Bloxom’s appeal and in the ancillary action it brought 

against Jason Laye. Bloxom filed timely notices of appeal in 

both cases, and we have consolidated them for decision.

II

Bloxom challenges the district court’s summary judgment 

ruling on two grounds. Its principal objection goes to timing. 

In Bloxom’s view, the district court abused its discretion 

denying its Rule 56(d) motions and should have instead given 

it the additional time it sought to develop the record before 

ruling on Seven Seas’ motion for summary judgment. In the 

alternative, Bloxom contends that unresolved questions of 

material fact precluded the entry of summary judgment even 

on the record that the district court did consider. 

Before turning to these contentions, we pause to emphasize that our analysis takes as its starting place assumptions 

by the parties that may or may not be legally sound. Seven 

Seas and Bloxom have litigated this case on the shared understanding that the Uniform Commercial Code’s standards for 
12 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

acceptance, rejection, and revocation are relevant to determining the scope of liability under 7 U.S.C. § 499b. Both in the 

district court and on appeal, Seven Seas has maintained that 

breach or no breach, Bloxom cannot prevail if it accepted the 

onions under § 2-606 of the UCC and did not revoke that acceptance under § 2-608. Rather than fight the legal premises 

underlying this contention, Bloxom has joined issue only on 

the facts, insisting alternatively that it did not accept the onions, that it did so in reasonable reliance on statements suggesting that the phytosanitary certificates were in place, or 

that it revoked its acceptance after learning that the certificates had not been procured. By litigating in this manner, 

Bloxom has implicitly accepted Seven Seas’ framing of the 

case and waived any legal arguments that could be raised 

against it. See O’Neal v. City of Chicago, 588 F.3d 406, 409 (7th 

Cir. 2009) (arguments not raised on appeal are waived). 

We underscore this point because the parties have left several legal questions unexamined in both the district court and 

on appeal. For one, the UCC does not appear to support the 

dispositive importance placed by the parties on acceptance. 

Section 2-607(2) of the UCC makes clear that “acceptance does 

not of itself impair any other remedy provided by this Article 

for non-conformity.” More broadly, it is not even clear that 

the UCC applies in the first place. The Perishable Agricultural 

Commodities Act does not incorporate the UCC, or any other 

source of state law for that matter. And its implementing regulations define many of the critical terms used in 7 U.S.C. 

§ 499b, including “reject without reasonable cause,” 7 C.F.R. 

§ 46.2(bb), and “acceptance,” id. at § 46.2(dd). Although it is 

certainly possible that the UCC could supplement those provisions as a matter of federal common law, we have never 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 13

expressly held that it does and deciding that question would 

call for careful analysis. 

None of the analysis that follows should be read to express 

any view on how these and other issues might be resolved in 

future cases.

A 

As for the merits, we begin on the substantive front with 

Bloxom’s challenge to the district court’s summary judgment 

ruling. We do so without deference to the analysis of the district court, drawing all reasonable inferences in the light most 

favorable to Bloxom. See Chi. Reg’l Council of Carpenters Pension Fund v. Schal Bovis, Inc., 826 F.3d 397, 402 (7th Cir. 2016). 

When a district court enters summary judgment on multiple independent grounds, reversal is appropriate only if none

of those grounds is supported by the record. What that means 

here is that Bloxom must prove that a reasonable trier of fact 

could find two things: first, that it delegated to Seven Seas the 

duty to procure phytosanitary certificates and, second, that it 

either did not accept the onions at the Port of Long Beach under § 2-606 of the UCC or that it validly revoked that acceptance under § 2-608. Because Bloxom’s inability to make 

the second of these two showings is clear, we focus on acceptance and revocation without considering the antecedent 

question of whether a reasonable jury could find that Seven 

Seas bore the burden of procuring phytosanitary certificates 

for the onions.

Which brings us to yet another issue. Neither the district 

court nor the parties have taken a position on which version of 

the UCC applies to this case. They have instead drawn disparately on the law of no fewer than four states. Seven Seas 
14 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

insists that “[n]o choice of law analysis is required because 

Article 2 of the UCC has been adopted” in every state whose 

law could conceivably apply. Although we follow the thinking, we do not agree. That two states have enacted the same 

version of the UCC does not mean that their respective courts 

have interpreted those provisions the same way. When those 

interpretations conflict, a choice must be made between one 

state’s law and the other’s, even if the provisions are identical. 

Neither Seven Seas nor Bloxom has identified any such conflict in this case, and both have drawn heavily on Illinois law. 

We will do so as well, without deciding what rules would 

govern the choice-of-law analysis were there a conflict.

Under Illinois’s codification of the UCC, “[a]cceptance of 

goods occurs when the buyer” does one of three things:

(a) after a reasonable opportunity to inspect the 

goods signifies to the seller that the goods 

are conforming or that he will take or retain 

them in spite of their non-conformity; or

(b) fails to make an effective rejection [under 

§ 5/2-602(1)], but such acceptance does not 

occur until the buyer has had a reasonable 

opportunity to inspect them; or 

(c) does any act inconsistent with the seller’s 

ownership; but if such act is wrongful as 

against the seller it is an acceptance only if 

ratified by him.

810 ILCS 5/2-606(1)(a)–(c). The district court held that Bloxom 

accepted the onions under § 606(1)(c). See F.C. Bloxom Co., 642 

F. Supp. 3d at 785. We see no error with that conclusion. It is 

difficult to imagine an act more “inconsistent with” Seven 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 15

Seas’ ownership of the onions than shipping them to a foreign 

country for sale to a customer with whom Seven Seas has no 

contractual relationship. 810 ILCS 5/2-606(1)(c). We note, too, 

that Bloxom did so with full knowledge that Seven Seas had 

failed to fax copies of the phytosanitary certificates and that 

the onions could not be inspected outside of the United States. 

Although it could have taken steps to investigate the status of 

the phytosanitary certificates before the onions left port, it did 

not do so, eliminating any possibility that the problem could 

be addressed and the consequences minimized.

We also agree with the district court’s assessment that 

Bloxom did not revoke that acceptance, even after learning 

that the phytosanitary certificates had never been procured. 

For revocation to be effective under § 5/2-608, it “must occur 

within a reasonable time after the buyer discovers or should 

have discovered the ground for it and before any substantial 

change in condition of the goods which is not caused by their 

own defects.” Id. § 5/2-608(2). Bloxom first learned that the 

phytosanitary certificates had not been procured on September 4. At no point in the months that followed did Bloxom 

notify Seven Seas of an intent to revoke.

To the contrary, Bloxom doubled down on its ownership 

in the letter agreement it signed settling the dispute over the 

cost of shipping the onions to Jacksonville. That agreement 

stated unequivocally that “ownership” of the onions would 

not “transfer from Bloxom Company to Seven Seas” during 

the time that Seven Seas attempted to sell them on 

consignment. At the time Bloxom signed this agreement, the 

non-existence of the phytosanitary certificates had been 

known for months. In full possession of this information, 
16 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

Bloxom took steps to reinforce, rather than disavow, its 

ownership of the onions.

The combination of Bloxom’s conduct at the Port of Long 

Beach and the contents of the letter agreement leave us with 

no doubt that the district court was right to enter summary 

judgment for Seven Seas.

B 

We close by addressing Bloxom’s contention that the district court was wrong to rule on Seven Seas’ summary judgment motion without giving it additional time to develop the 

record. Our review of that claim is only for an abuse of discretion, see Arnold v. Villarreal, 853 F.3d 384, 389 (7th Cir. 2017), 

and we see none.

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(b) authorizes parties to 

move for summary judgment “at any time” until 30 days after

the close of discovery, regardless of whether discovery has 

been completed or even begun. See Waterloo Furniture Components, Ltd. v. Haworth, Inc., 467 F.3d 641, 648 (7th Cir. 2006) 

(“Rule 56 does not require that discovery take place in all 

cases before summary judgment can be granted.”). This flexibility reflects the foundational premise that discovery is not 

an end unto itself, but rather only a means of determining 

whether there are genuine issues of material fact that necessitate a trial. When evidence comes to light that conclusively 

establishes or conclusively forecloses a party’s entitlement to 

relief, further discovery becomes futile and wasteful. Rule 

56(b), in short, allows and indeed encourages parties under 

these circumstances to use summary judgment to bring litigation to a “just, speedy, and inexpensive” end. See Fed. R. Civ. 

P. 1. 
Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 17

For its part, Rule 56(d) protects non-movants who believe 

a summary judgment motion has been filed prematurely. It 

“permits a district court to delay consideration of a summary 

judgment motion and order additional discovery before ruling if the non-movant demonstrates that ‘it cannot present 

facts essential to justify its opposition.’” Sterk, 770 F.3d at 627–

28 (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(d)). A party seeking to invoke 

the rule must support their request with a sworn “affidavit or 

declaration” that gives “specific reasons discovery should be 

extended.” Smith v. OSF Healthcare Sys., 933 F.3d 859, 864 (7th 

Cir. 2019). 

A Rule 56(d) affidavit must do more than express “a fond 

hope” that additional discovery would uncover useful evidence. MAO-MSO Recovery II, LLC v. State Farm Mut. Auto. 

Ins. Co., 994 F.3d 869, 877 (7th Cir. 2021). It must instead identify with specificity the information that additional discovery 

is expected to uncover. Even more, it must explain how that 

information would allow the non-movant to proceed to trial 

on the legal theory articulated by its adversary. As we have 

recognized many times over the years, a district court need 

not permit discovery that would make no difference. See 

Grayson v. O’Neill, 308 F.3d 808, 816 (7th Cir. 2002); Arnold, 853 

F.3d at 389; Jimenez v. Kiefer, 100 F.4th 931, 939 (7th Cir. 2024). 

Applying these principles here, the district court acted 

well within its discretion in denying Bloxom’s Rule 56(d) motions. Bloxom supported its motions with declarations from 

its counsel. Those declarations focused almost exclusively on 

information related to the conduct of Jason Laye, information 

that would prove useful to establishing that Seven Seas bore 

the burden of procuring phytosanitary certificates. But that 

information had no obvious relevance to Seven Seas’ 
18 Nos. 22-3268 & 23-1022 

alternative, UCC-based theory for summary judgment. Nowhere did Bloxom’s counsel even attempt to explain how additional discovery would allow it to survive summary judgment on that issue. Under these circumstances, the district 

court was free to determine that additional discovery was not 

warranted. We see no abuse of discretion in the district court 

concluding that it was time for this litigation to end. 

For these reasons, we AFFIRM.