## Facts

- Family Dollar operated over 6,000 discount retail stores organized into districts, each overseen by a district manager supervising multiple stores.
- Family Dollar classified all store managers as exempt “executives” and paid them a salary without overtime.
- Store managers alleged they were misclassified and routinely worked about 60–70 hours per week performing largely manual tasks.
- Evidence showed detailed corporate manuals and district-manager control limited store-manager discretion over operations, budgeting, and staffing decisions.
- Store managers presented evidence that they spent most of their time on nonexempt work (e.g., stocking, cashiering, unloading trucks, cleaning) because stores operated with limited labor budgets.
- The district court certified an opt-in FLSA collective action of 1,424 store managers and later denied a motion to decertify.
- After a second jury trial, the jury found the managers were nonexempt, Family Dollar’s FLSA violations were willful, and overtime wages were owed; the court entered judgment awarding back wages plus equal liquidated damages (about $35.6 million total).
- Family Dollar appealed, challenging collective treatment, exemption proof, willfulness, and the use of representative evidence and payroll records for hours and damages.

## Issues

1. Whether the district court abused its discretion by maintaining a collective action on the ground that the store managers were “similarly situated.”
2. Whether sufficient evidence supported the jury’s finding that Family Dollar failed to prove the FLSA executive exemption.
3. Whether sufficient evidence supported the jury’s finding of willfulness, supporting a three-year limitations period and liquidated damages.
4. Whether the district court erred in trial management, including the use of representative testimony, payroll records, and jury instructions on exemption and willfulness.

## Decision

- The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the judgment for the store managers.
- The court held the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying decertification because common job duties, uniform corporate policies, and a uniform exemption classification supported “similarly situated” status.
- The court held a reasonable jury could find the managers’ primary duty was not management given the substantial time spent on manual work and constrained discretion, so Family Dollar failed to establish the executive exemption.
- The court held the willfulness finding was supported by evidence that Family Dollar knew managers performed substantial nonexempt work and worked long hours yet failed to meaningfully assess whether the exemption applied.
- The court rejected challenges to representative proof, payroll-record-based damages calculations, and the jury instructions as applied at trial.

## Legal Principles

- FLSA collective actions may proceed when opt-in plaintiffs are “similarly situated,” and district courts may use a staged approach that includes later scrutiny at the decertification stage.
- The employer bears the burden to prove an FLSA exemption; the executive exemption turns on a fact-intensive “primary duty” analysis, including actual job duties and degree of discretion, not titles alone.
- A willful FLSA violation exists when the employer knew, or showed reckless disregard for, whether its pay practices were unlawful; willfulness extends the limitations period to three years.
- Representative testimony and employer payroll records may be used to prove hours and damages in collective actions when they provide a reliable common evidentiary basis and the plaintiffs are similarly situated.
- Liquidated damages may be awarded where the violation is not shown to be in good faith and reasonable.

## Conclusion

The Eleventh Circuit upheld collective treatment and a substantial FLSA overtime judgment against Family Dollar, concluding that evidence of standardized corporate control and predominantly manual work supported the jury’s rejection of the executive exemption and its finding of willful violations justifying extended limitations and liquidated damages.


Morgan v. Family Dollar Stores, Inc., 551 F.3d 1233 (11th Cir. 2008)