ASA Adjudication on Walkers Snack Foods Ltd

Ad

A promotion on packets of Walkers crisps for entrants to win £10 if they could correctly predict where and when in the country it would rain. Individual entrants were permitted to enter up to twice a day.

Issue

The complainant, who had purchased sufficient packets of crisps to enter the promotion twice a day, but was later informed by the advertiser that the number of entries had been reduced to one per day per person, challenged whether the promotion had been conducted fairly.

Response

Walkers Snack Foods Ltd (Walkers) said the original allowance of two plays per day, per account for the Rainy Days promotion was based on demand for previous Walkers promotions over the last three years. They said they had also looked at other, similar industry promotions, but they believed the mechanic of the Rainy Days promotion had not been used before.

Walkers said during the initial launch phase of the promotion it became clear that consumer engagement in the promotion would far exceed the estimated levels as demand was far outstripping supply of the available grid spots, which were limited to 21,271 different areas of the UK and Ireland per day, and which could not be changed due to the limitations of Met Office tracking and to ensure data accuracy. They said the number of plays per day was therefore finite and, coupled with the high level of demand, it was clear that to do nothing would not be fair to the wider customer base who wished to participate. Walkers said, in light of that, they took the decision to reduce the number of plays to once per day in order to allow the maximum number of consumers the chance to participate. They said that decision was made prior to the start of the TV and online campaign and before promotional packs reached full distribution at retail. They pointed out that neither their advertising nor the promotional packs stated the number of plays permissible per day but instead advised customers to look at the terms and conditions on the website.

Walkers said that change to the terms and conditions was communicated by e-mail to all customers who had registered an account during the initial launch phase, and that the terms and conditions on the website and various FAQs and other online text were also updated to reflect the change. They said any new customers registering after that point would not have been explicitly made aware that the terms had changed, but would have been required to agree to the new terms which stipulated one play per day, per account. They said, in addition, their consumer services team had been fully briefed on the change in order to deal effectively with enquiries, which included responding directly and publicly to queries on the Walkers Facebook page. Walkers said they made every effort to ensure that the change in the rules was proactively communicated to consumers in an effective manner. They said, following extensive review, they believed that they had conducted the promotion fairly for all participants and did not believe that the change to the terms and conditions undermined the integrity of the promotion.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA understood that, once players had obtained a code from a promotional pack of crisps, they could enter the competition online by selecting a grid reference from a map of the UK, and choosing a three-hour period on a particular day when they believed it might rain on that area. We noted that the competition had 21,271 grid spots available each day for the seven weeks the promotion ran, resulting in a total of 1.04m spots available for play during the whole competition. We understood that Walkers had estimated demand for the competition on a previous promotion, and that they believed there were sufficient grid spots available. However, we did not consider that that previous promotion, which we understood comprised point redemption and a reverse auction, was sufficiently similar to the mechanic of the Rainy Days promotion to be able to make a reasonable estimate of demand.

Notwithstanding the above, we noted that between the start of the promotion (12 September) and the date on which the conditions of play were changed (29 September), over 40,000 people had registered and taken part in the promotion. We considered that those participants would expect to be able to purchase and bank codes in accordance with the original conditions, and would be disappointed to find that their opportunity to participate in the promotion was reduced after the conditions were changed. We considered that it was not acceptable for Walkers to alter the terms and conditions of play during the competition, because to do so could cause unnecessary disappointment to participants, and we therefore concluded that the promotion had not been administered fairly.

The promotion breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 8.2 (Sales promotions) and 8.23 (Prize promotions).

Action

The promotion must not appear again in its current form.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)