ASA Adjudication on Innocent Ltd

Ad

A TV and press ad for Innocent smoothies.

a. The TV ad featured a man seated at a table in a field. The voice-over said "Hello. We'd like to show you the difference between a juice and an Innocent smoothie." An orange appeared to the right of the man, suspended in mid-air above a juicer. A blender then appeared to the left of the man and was surrounded by grapes, strawberries and bananas. The voice-over continued: "This is juice" as the man appeared to cut the orange in half with his finger; the orange then squeezed itself on the juicer. The voice-over said "This is an Innocent Smoothie. The juice and much more of the fruit too." The fruit then 'jumped' into the blender. On-screen text read "We sieve out the pips & tough bits." As the man pressed the pulse button on the blender and the fruit mixed together, the voice-over said "All this fruit ... the flesh, the fibre, more of the good stuff." The man dipped his finger in the smoothie mixture, licked it off and then licked his lips. The voice-over continued "It's even better for you that way" as pack shots of different Innocent products popped up around the man. The ad ended by showing a carton of smoothie, three bottles of smoothie, two cartons of kids' smoothie and an assortment of fruit. The voice-over said "Innocent smoothies. Nothing but nothing but fruit" while on-screen text read "innocent smoothies nothing but nothing but fruit".

b. The press ad was headlined "We crush all of this ... into this.*" Two arrows pointed from the text to a carton of strawberry and banana flavour Innocent smoothie and a pile of fruit. Text continued "The thing about our smoothies is that they're made from crushed whole fruit. Not just the liquidy bit (also known as juice) but the whole darned shooting match. So you get all of the flesh, fibre, vitamins, antioxidants and other good bits that some other drinks leave behind. You lucky old thing. Innocent smoothies. Nothing but nothing but fruit."

Issue

In relation to the TV ad, DDB London, complaining on behalf of Pepsico, Smoothie Revolution Ltd and two viewers challenged whether:

1. it misleadingly implied that smoothies had a higher fruit content than freshly squeezed juice;

2. the claim " ... the flesh, the fibre, more of the good stuff ... it's even better for you that way" was misleading as to the health benefits of smoothies over freshly squeezed juice, particularly in relation to the fibre content; and

3. it unfairly denigrated freshly squeezed juice by implying that it was less beneficial than it was.

In relation to the press ad, Smoothie Revolution Ltd also challenged the claim:

4. " ... made from crushed whole fruit.  Not just the liquidy bit (also known as juice) but the whole darned shooting match.  So you get all of the flesh, fibre, vitamins, antioxidants and other good bits ...", because they understood that smoothies did not contain the whole fruit and that some nutrients were lost in the smoothie-making process.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

BCAP TV Code

Response

1. Innocent said the TV ad was intended to demonstrate the different processes involved in making smoothies and juice because their research had shown that there was confusion, within the UK market, about how the two products differed.  They said a smoothie consisted of crushed whole fruit, demonstrated in the ad with the use of a blender, whereas juice was made by squeezing fruit, demonstrated by using a squeezer.  Innocent explained that this was the difference they had sought to underline by the demonstration in the TV ad using kitchen appliances.   

Innocent disagreed that the ad implied smoothies had a higher fruit content than juice and asserted that they had not sought to compare like with like in the demonstration. They said they had not suggested that the amount of liquid squeezed represented a portion of juice or that the amount of fruit blended represented a portion of smoothie.  

Clearcast (formerly the BACC) said their consultant had reviewed the evidence submitted by Innocent and had advised them that, whilst a smoothie did not contain the whole fruit, it contained more of the whole fruit than freshly squeezed juice.  They said they had therefore concluded that the claim was not misleading.

2. Innocent said the claim "the flesh, the fibre, more of the good stuff" referred to the smoothie-making process.  They explained that they crushed, rather than squeezed fruit, and said they believed that method ensured that smoothies retained more of the goodness of the whole fruit.  

Innocent said the average crushed whole fruit content of their smoothies was 50%; the other 50% was made up of freshly squeezed juice.  They told the ASA that the two components of crushed fruit, the skin and the pulp, contained different nutritional benefits.  Innocent explained that fibre and phytonutrients were found in the skin of fruit and, because their smoothies contained crushed whole fruit, they contained more skin and therefore more fibre and phytonutrients than a fruit juice.  They added that fruit pulp was also an important source of nutrients. Innocent said they believed, in the example of orange juice, that fruit pulp was removed in the manufacturing process and, consequently, the benefits of the fruit pulp were lost.

Innocent sent us a table showing a comparison of the nutritional breakdown, per 100 ml, per 250 ml and per 100 kcal, of their smoothie range, a concentrated and a non-concentrated orange juice.  Innocent said their smoothies contained more fibre, as well as the same, or more, Vitamin C, than either concentrated or non-concentrated orange juice and this was the claim being made in the TV ad.

Innocent pointed out that, according to EU Regulation 1924/2006, a claim that a product was a source of fibre could be made if the product contained at least 3 g of fibre per 100 ml or at lest 1.5 g of fibre per 100 kcal.  They stated that, on average across the range, Innocent Smoothies had much more than 1.5 g of fibre per 100 kcal.

Innocent sent a statement from their expert, a professor of nutrition.  The expert said fruit, as a food group, provided a mix of benefits which varied between fruits.  He explained that those benefits were distributed between the skin, pulp and filtered juice.  He said it was important to eat a range of fruits to ensure the optimum dietary balance of fruit-based nutrients and said this was unlikely to be obtained from eating a single fruit.  He acknowledged that all fruit-based foods and juices were nutritionally valuable but, because smoothies contained more of the characteristics of several different whole fruits than a single juice, he believed that smoothies provided a better range of fruit-based nutrients than fruit juice alone.

Clearcast said their consultant believed the claim "... the flesh, the fibre, more of the good stuff ... it's even better for you that way" was justified because the whole fruit was used as the base for a smoothie and was then crushed and sieved.  She had explained that the process resulted in the loss of some of the fibre and meant that smoothies did not contain the whole of the fruit.  Nevertheless, Clearcast said they believed the TV ad made clear that the sieving and removal of some parts of the fruit resulted from the smoothie-making process.  Clearcast told us their consultant had concluded that smoothies contained more of the "good stuff" and were therefore "better for you".

3. Innocent disagreed that their ad denigrated juice and said they thought the ad made clear that both juice and smoothies had nutritional benefits.  They said the ad simply underlined that smoothies were "even better for you" than juice, a claim that they believed was justified for the reasons outlined at point (2) above. Innocent added that it was not in their interest to denigrate juice, because not only was it an ingredient in their smoothies, as stated in the TV ad, but they also produced a range of fruit juices.  

Clearcast said the ad did not ridicule, discredit or unfairly attack juice.  They thought it simply outlined the difference between juice and an Innocent smoothie. Clearcast said the ad contained factual statements agreed by their consultant and assured the ASA that the final script had been approved following lengthy discussion by their copy clearance team.

4. Innocent explained that the press ad was intended to support the TV ad by educating consumers about the different processes involved in making juices and smoothies.  They also intended the ad to communicate that, because smoothies were made from whole crushed fruit as well as juice, they provided more of the benefits of the whole fruit than juice alone.  Innocent said the claim highlighted the key differences in the nutritional content of smoothies that arose from using whole crushed fruit in the manufacturing process.  They said they did not believe nutrients were lost in significant quantities during the the smoothie-making process, though they did not have data to support that.  Innocent said they had no further plans to use the press ad.

Assessment

1. Not upheld

The ASA noted the comments submitted by Innocent and Clearcast.  We noted the intention of the ad was to demonstrate how the processes of making smoothies and juice differed and also noted Innocent had not intended to make a comparison about the quantities of fruit that made up each product.

We considered that viewers would not infer from the demonstration showing one half of an orange being squeezed for "juice" and a large portion of mixed fruit for the "smoothie"  that more fruit by volume was used to make a smoothie than to make an equivalent portion of freshly squeezed juice.  We considered that viewers would perceive the ad to be comparing two different types of fruit drink and would infer from the demonstration that the difference between the two was that the Innocent smoothie was made from a blend of several whole fruits, whereas the juice was made by squeezing fresh oranges.   We concluded that the presentation of the comparison was unlikely to mislead.

On this point, we investigated the TV ad under CAP (Broadcast) TV Advertising Standards Code rules 5.1 (Misleading advertising) and 5.4.6 (Comparative advertising) but did not find it in breach.

2. Not upheld

We noted the comments made by Innocent and Clearcast.  We understood that they believed the claim was justified because consuming one of the Innocent Smoothies was closer to eating the whole fruit than drinking an equivalent portion of freshly squeezed juice.  They believed a portion of Innocent Smoothie was therefore more nutritionally beneficial as a whole than an equivalent portion of freshly squeezed juice.  

The ASA took expert advice.  The expert confirmed that there were health benefits associated with eating a variety of fruit and explained that there were possible synergistic interactions between the different components, the benefits of which were lessened by any extraction of individual components.  For that reason, the expert said she believed smoothies may have increased health benefits over juice since they were closer to whole fruits (and vegetables) than isolated components.   

We understood that, according to EU Regulation 1924/2006, a nutrition claim was defined as "... any claim which states, suggests or implies that a food has particular beneficial nutritional properties due to ... the nutrients or other substances it contains ...".  We considered that the claim "... the flesh, the fibre, more of the good stuff ..." was a nutrition claim.  Our expert advised that the Food Standards Agency (FSA) provided guidance on nutrition claims including claims for the nutrient fibre.  We understood from the FSA that, to make a claim that a food was a source of fibre, it should contain at least 3 g of fibre per 100 ml or at least 1.5 g of fibre per 100 kcal.

We noted our expert had indicated that smoothies may have increased health benefits over freshly squeezed juice because they were closer to the whole fruit. We noted the claim "the flesh, the fibre, more of the good stuff ..." was followed by the claim "It's even better for you that way" and considered that the implication of the ad as a whole was that the presence of fibre, among other things, in the smoothies, conveyed a health benefit.  We noted all but one variety of the Innocent Smoothies contained at least 1.5 g of fibre per 100 kcal.  We considered that viewers were likely to understand the nutrition claim in the context  of the Innocent Smoothies range.  Although we noted one variety in the range fell very slightly below the fibre requirement for a source of fibre claim, we noted the ad showed strawberries, grapes and bananas being blended (fruit used in making the strawberry and banana Innocent Smoothies) and the other eight products in the Innocent Smoothie range fulfilled the criteria for a source of fibre claim. We concluded that the reference to fibre in the context of the claims "more of the good stuff" and "It's even better for you that way" was acceptable.

On this point, we investigated the ad under CAP Broadcast (TV) Advertising Standards Code rules 5.1 (Misleading advertising) and 8.3.1 (Accuracy in food advertising) but did not find it in breach.  

3. Not upheld

We understood that the claim "its even better for you that way" was intended to highlight Innocents belief that smoothies were more beneficial than freshly squeezed juice because they were closer to the whole fruit and therefore contained more of the benefits.  We noted our expert had indicated that smoothies could have increased benefits over juice, because of the possible synergistic interactions between components of different fruits.  We also noted Innocent's argument that they produced a range of juices and it would not therefore be in their interest to denigrate juice.  We considered that viewers were unlikely to infer from the ad that freshly squeezed juice was less beneficial than it was, merely that smoothies could have additional benefits.  We concluded that the ad neither discredited nor unfairly attacked freshly squeezed juice.

On this point, we investigated the TV ad under CAP Broadcast (TV) Advertising Standards Code rule 5.4.3 (Denigration) but did not find it in breach.

4. Not upheld

We noted Innocent's comments and took expert advice.  

The expert indicated that Innocent's smoothie-making process excluded some parts of certain fruits because they were inedible or potentially harmful.  She added that it was plausible that other parts of the fruit were omitted to some extent, because of the processes involved in making smoothies, and if that was so it might not be entirely accurate to describe smoothies as containing "the whole crushed fruit".  

The expert agreed with Innocent that deterioration in nutrient levels in fruit was a normal process between harvesting and consumption and there was therefore no reason to believe that Innocent's smoothie-making process would especially hasten nutrient degradation.

We understood that Innocent's smoothie-making process itself was unlikely to result in a significant loss of nutrients.  We considered that readers were likely to infer from the claim "... made from the crushed whole fruit ... all of the flesh, fibre, vitamins, antioxidants and other good bits ..." that Innocent smoothies consisted of the entire edible fruit, excluding only those bits not normally consumed, for example, banana skins.  Innocent explained that, when fruit such as strawberries were sieved, they used a specially designed sieve that allowed the seeds and flesh to pass through, retaining only the inedible calyx on top of the berry.  They said the bananas, for example, were peeled by hand and crushed whole and added to the blend.  Because we understood that the processing of the whole crushed fruit in Innocent Smoothies retained all the edible parts of the fruit, we concluded that the claim was unlikely to mislead.

On this point, we investigated the press ad under CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation) and 7.1 (Truthfulness) but did not find it in breach.

Action

No further action necessary.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)