ASA Adjudication on Ideal Shopping Direct plc

Ad

An Ideal World teleshopping ad advertised a five-piece Blue Magic cleaning set. One presenter said the two bottles of liquid in the set could be diluted to produce 300 bottles of solution. The presentation included a demonstration in which a presenter said "One of these bottles will make you 150 spray-bottles"; he then part filled a spray-bottle with the liquid saying "All you do is fill it to the first marker" and "That is enough for one full bottle", diluted it with water and used the solution to remove a variety of stains, including red wine, coffee, chocolate and wax crayons, from a piece of cream carpet.

Issue

The complainant said the presentation was misleading because it implied that the spray bottle could be refilled 300 times.  He said the ad made no mention of the need to dilute the liquid to different concentrations depending on the type of stain to be cleaned.  He believed the demonstration implied that the dilution shown, which was used to clean the heavy stains, would produce 300 refills.  He had bought the product and, if filled to the first marker on the spray bottle, the set would fill the spray bottle fewer than 35 times.  

Response

Ideal World said the liquid could be diluted to different strengths depending on the task for which it was needed.  If someone wanted to use it on general paint-work, for example, it should be diluted 1 part cleaning liquid to 150 parts water.  For medium stains that ratio was 1:50 and for heavy stains, like those in the ad, 1:10.  They said, based on the weakest solution of 1 part liquid to 150 parts water, one could make up three hundred 500-ml refill spray bottles from the 1000 ml of liquid supplied with the set.  They said all the statements in the ad were true but accepted that it could have been clearer that the number of refills stated was not based on the demonstrated dilution ratio.

Assessment

Complaint upheld

The ASA noted the liquid could produce up to 300 refills of solution based on the weakest solution.  We considered that the ad implied that the liquid, at a dilution that produced 300 bottles, could remove the stubborn stains shown in the ad.  Because the liquid at that dilution could not and because customers who wished to use the product for medium to heavy stain removal would be able to make-up significantly fewer than 300 bottles, we considered the ad misleading.

The ad breached CAP (Broadcast) TV Advertising Standards Code rules 5.1 (Misleading advertising), 5.2.1 (Evidence) and 5.2.2 (Implications).

Action

The ad must not be shown in this form again.  Any future ads should make clear the basis on which the claim about 300 refills is made.