Ad description
A poster for a metal recycling service, which was seen on the side of a lorry on 14 April 2011, featured an image of a woman who was kneeling on the floor with her back to the camera. She was wearing a pair of low-slung jeans that exposed the top of her bottom and her torso was covered only by a pair of braces.
Issue
Three complainants, who believed the ad was sexist and demeaning to women, challenged whether it was offensive.
Response
Dalton Group Ltd (Dalton Group) stated that the image was of a plumber repairing a copper pipe. They said the ad had been on display for the last 12-months and they had not received any complaints prior to the ASA contacting them.
Dalton Group considered that a small number of complainants had found the ad to be sexist and demeaning to women but they pointed out that the Code stated that ads might be distasteful without necessarily breaching the Code. They believed that other advertising, including underwear advertising, showed far more revealing images than had been shown in their ad. They did not believe that the complaints could be seen to demonstrate that the ad was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA considered that the image was not sexually explicit but that it was sexually provocative. We noted that the ad was for a scrap metal recycling company and that the image bore no relevance to the advertised service.
We considered that the provocative image, and in particular the focus on the woman’s bottom, was likely to be seen as gratuitous and demeaning to women. Because of that, and because the image appeared in an untargeted medium and bore no relevance to the advertised service, we concluded that it was likely to cause serious offence to some individuals.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rule 4.1 (Harm and offence).
Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form.
