ASA Adjudication on DFS Trading Ltd

Ad

a. A TV ad, for a furniture store, featured people miming, dancing and playing air guitar to a rock song, while standing in front of, or sitting on, a range of sofas. Some of the sofas appeared to be oversized.

b. Another TV ad, for the same furniture store, was the same as ad (a), but featured a different range of sofas.

c. A further TV ad for the furniture store was the same as ad (a) and (b), but featured a different range of sofas.

Issue

21 viewers challenged whether the ads misleadingly implied that the sofas sold by the advertiser were bigger than they actually were, because they believed the people in the ads had been superimposed on the sofas in a way that exaggerated the sofas' size.

BCAP TV Code

Response

DFS Trading Ltd (DFS) said they did not intend to exaggerate the size of any of the sofas in the ads. They said that normally in their ads they filmed actors, either on location in homes or in a DFS showroom, with a range of products. They explained, however, that in this instance the ad had been filmed differently. DFS explained that the ad was inspired by the music track that featured in it, which was a song called 'Rockstar' by the group Nickleback. They said the video for that song featured members of the group, as well as members of the public, in various world locations singing and dancing to the song. DFS said they decided to imitate the original music video by using real people miming to the song in a home environment.

DFS said that during a sale period it could be a challenge to show a wide enough range of products that was representative of the breadth of products available during the campaign. They explained that they had filmed the actors against a 'green screen', to be superimposed later onto a room background or a sofa background, in order to be able to produce more ads featuring more products than usual. They explained that, during filming, a 'typical' sofa was used as a reference point and in case the actor needed to use one during their performance.

DFS explained that the images of the sofas were supplied either by the agency, or from existing photos of the products. They said the agency then matched the sofa images to locations from their library of room backgrounds. They said once the background had been chosen, the sofa image was then superimposed on top of it. They explained that, in order to ensure that the new product image was the correct size and angle, the product that was originally in the background image was used as a template for size and angles. They said they took particular care to ensure that the new superimposed sofas appeared as 'real' in their chosen background as possible.

DFS said the actors ranged from children to adults, and that the featured products measured between 7'3" and 9'3". They said the actors were chosen relative to their size and the size of the product.

DFS said they believed that people typically visited their stores to examine an item in detail before purchase. They argued that, had they exaggerated the size of their sofas, they would have caused widespread disappointment and large numbers of complaints to Trading Standards, which had not been the case.

DFS said the products were part of a promotional campaign that had now ended. They explained that the products featured in the ad were no longer part of their normal range, and because the sofas were made to order, they no longer had any of the featured sofas in stock. They said they were therefore unable to provide photographs of the sofas in order to demonstrate their size. DFS did submit copies of three press ads that featured three different sofas with people sitting on them. They said those sofas had also featured in the TV ad and that the images were actual photographs that had not been manipulated. They suggested that the size of those sofas could be compared with those in the TV ad.

Clearcast said DFS stocked a large range of sofas, of different sizes. They said they supported the response provided by DFS and did not believe the ad was misleading.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA noted the description of the production technique provided by DFS, and we also noted their argument that reasonable care had been taken to ensure that the featured sofas were correctly sized in the ad, and that the actors were shown in proportion to those sofas. We acknowledged that we had requested photographic evidence of the size of the advertised sofas after the promotional period had ended, but that DFS were unable to obtain photos of the sofas because they were no longer in stock. Nevertheless, we considered that the three press ads submitted by DFS were not sufficient to prove the size of the sofas featured in the TV ad. We noted that DFS said it had not intended to exaggerate the size of any of the sofas featured in the ad. However, we considered that the production technique used in the ad meant that some of the sofas did appear large in relation to the actors. Because DFS had not been able to demonstrate that the sofas featured in the ad were accurate reflections of the actual sofas, we concluded that the ad was misleading.

Ads (a), (b) and (c) breached CAP (Broadcast) TV Advertising Standards Code rules 5.1 (Misleading advertising), 5.2.2 (Implications) and 5.4.1 (Visual techniques and special effects).

Action

The ads must not be broadcast again in their current form.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)