A food company claims in a suit filed in federal court in Camden that a competitor offered to buy a portion of its business for the sole purpose of obtaining its trade secrets before abruptly calling off the deal.

J&J Snack Foods Inc. of Pennsauken claims in its complaint that it signed a letter of intent to sell its Patio brand of frozen burritos to Ruiz Food Products Inc. of Dinuba, California, on July 8, but Ruiz called off the sale, without giving a reason, Sept. 1. In the meantime, J&J shared with Ruiz its product formulas, ingredient specifications, pricing information, sales and earning data, vendor lists and details of its relationship with Wal-Mart, according to the suit.

Ruiz “improperly used J&J's efforts to effectuate the potential sale in order to obtain confidential and proprietary J&J data for the purpose of competing unlawfully with J&J,” according to the complaint in J&J Snack Foods v. Ruiz Food Products.