Bines in bangle bingle
Woman being sued by fitness queen hits back
A WOMAN who is being sued for defamation by Gold Coast fitness queen Ashy Bines has hit back with a counterclaim for $145,840.
Pinar Parry is defending Ms Bines’s $120,000 defamation claim against her over comments she made in a YouTube video about “an influencer campaign that went horribly wrong’’.
Ms Parry claims she had a collaboration with Ms Bines to promote Ms Parry’s product – bracelets inscribed with Ms Bines’s name and inspirational quotes – on social media.
In her counterclaim, filed with the court, Ms Parry says she suffered loss and damage over thousands of unsold customised Ashy Bines bracelets after Ms Bines failed to regularly promote them.
Ms Parry says her business, Delta-Me, also lost profits after it missed out on opportunities to partner with other social media “influencers’’.
She says Ms Bines breached a written contract by failing to regularly promote the wristbands on social media and at “booty events’’ last year.
Ms Parry relies on representations allegedly made by Ashy Bines’s “agent’’ for negotiating the wristband promotion contract.
She claims the “agent’’, an employee of Ms Bines, told her: “Ashy would definitely wear and promote them heavily.’’
She says Ms Parry’s wristbands were mentioned only six times on social media by Ms Bines and only worn by her twice in Instagram posts from February last year.
Ms Bines unfollowed DeltaMe’s Instagram page in July last year, “ostracising the company from Ms Bines’s online following’’, Ms Parry’s defence says. She also failed to promote Ms Parry’s company as a sponsor of the Ashy Bines World Squad Tour 2017, her defence says.
Ms Parry admits she uploaded a video titled “The day I got rolled by a major Australian influencer (and what happened next)’’ on March 22.
Ms Bines claimed the video was downloaded by 418 people and contained several defamatory imputations. Ms Parry claims the imputations were substantially true.
Ms Bines is also suing Ms Parry over an alleged defamatory “interview’’ with a Mamamia.com.au senior content producer.
Ms Parry says she never spoke to the producer but consented to the website using a quote: “Ashy Bines breached our contract and nearly bankrupted our business.’’