Ad description
A website for Channel Jumper Ltd, www.channeljumper.com, seen in April 2018, featured a webpage titled “Our Knitwear”. Large text towards the top of the page stated “Channel Jumper in Alderney brings you the finest quality traditional sweaters from the Channel Islands.”
On a separate page, titled “Channel Jumper”, text stated “Established in 1976, Channel Jumper was started as a Cottage Industry with the intention to revive the Alderney sweater which had not been seen since WWI and to establish a knitting industry on the island.”
Issue
Guernsey Woollens Ltd, who understood that Channel Jumper’s sweaters were not manufactured on the Channel islands, challenged whether the ad misleadingly implied that they were.
Response
Channel Jumper Ltd said that the company was registered in Alderney and that the references to Alderney on the website were relevant and in context with their presence on the island, where the company was located.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA considered that consumers would understand from the ad’s emphasis on the company and jumper’s heritage, including claims such as “Channel Jumper was started as a Cottage Industry with the intention to revive the Alderney sweater…and to establish a knitting industry on the island” and “Channel Jumper in Alderney brings you the finest quality traditional sweaters from the Channel Islands”, that Channel Jumper was based in Alderney and that the sweaters were also manufactured there.
We noted that Channel Jumper was registered on the island of Alderney and that the business was based there. However, Channel Jumper did not provide evidence that showed that their products were also manufactured on Alderney, or the Channel Islands.
Because consumers were likely to infer that Channel Jumper’s sweaters were manufactured on the island of Alderney, when the advertiser did not provide any information which showed that that was the case, we concluded that the ad was misleading.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 3.1 Marketing communications must not materially mislead or be likely to do so. (Misleading advertising) and 3.7 3.7 Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove claims that consumers are likely to regard as objective and that are capable of objective substantiation. The ASA may regard claims as misleading in the absence of adequate substantiation. (Substantiation).
Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Channel Jumper not to claim or imply that their sweaters were manufactured in Alderney or the Channel Islands if that was not the case.
