ASA Adjudication on Zapf Creation AG

Ad

A television ad for the "BABYborn Mummy Look I can Swim" doll featured the BABYborn logo and a young girl asking "what next BABYborn?" A group of dolls in swimming costumes were shown in front of a swimming pool background and one doll was shown swimming in a pool with two young girls. Three dolls were featured floating across the water with "she really swims" written on screen. Underwater shots showed a young girl putting the doll face-down in the pool and the doll swimming. The lyrics to the background music were "Now BABYborn swims … and swims … Just put her in … and teach BABYborn to swim!” to the tune of the Blue Danube. The ad ended with a shot of the doll, wearing a swimming costume and safety float, seated on a large oyster shell chair, with the voice-over saying "My little BABYborn Mummy Look I can Swim really swims when she hits the water! From Zapf Creation."

Issue

A viewer questioned whether the ad was potentially harmful in showing children swimming without adult supervision, because children could emulate the ad.

BCAP TV Code

Response

Clearcast said the swimming pool scenes were closely shot and the whole pool was not shown; as such it was not possible to tell whether or not there was anyone near the girls in the pool.  They said the ad had a fanciful and theatrical appearance.  They felt that while no adult supervision was shown, that did not necessarily mean that adults were not present.  They said it might have been problematic to use wider or longer shots of the pool without showing an adult close by, and said they would not have cleared the ad if the children had been shown in an unsafe, vulnerable or potentially harmful situation.  However, they felt this was not the case in the ad.

Assessment

Not upheld

The ASA acknowledged that the ad did not clearly show whether there was an adult supervising the children playing and swimming in the pool.  However, we considered that children would have to gain access to a swimming pool and be allowed to take the doll into the pool in order to emulate the action in the ad and we concluded it would be unlikely that children would be unsupervised in that case.

Because we considered it unlikely that children would be able to play with the doll in a swimming pool without adult supervision, we concluded that the ad was not harmful and was unlikely to be emulated by children.

We investigated the ad under CAP (Broadcast) TV Advertising Standards Code rules 6.7 (Harm and offence) and 7.4.2 (Children), but did not find it in breach.

Action

No further action necessary.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)