Ad description
Pages on DUSK’s website, www.dusk.com, seen in August and September 2025:
a. A page on the advertiser’s website, seen on 22 August 2025, stated “END OF SUMMER SALE, UP TO 50% OFF + AN EXTRA 20% OFF EVERYTHING. USE CODE: BH20”.
b. A page on the advertiser’s website, seen on 26 August 2025, stated, “GET AN EXTRA 15% OFF*. USE CODE: EXTRA15”.
c. A page on the advertiser’s website, seen on 29 August 2025, stated, “BECAUSE IT’S PAYDAY GET AN EXTRA 20% OFF*. USE CODE: PAYDAY20”.
d. A page on the advertiser’s website, seen on 2 September 2025, stated, “It’s Our Birthday! TO CELEBRATE UNLOCK YOUR MYSTERY DISCOUNT. Code: REVEAL. UP TO 20% OFF”.
Issue
Simba Sleep Ltd challenged whether the savings claims were misleading because they understood that a number of the products to which the claimed savings applied had not been sold at the higher, undiscounted prices for a sufficient time period.
Response
DUSK (Retail) Ltd t/a DUSK provided sales data for three mattress products raised in the complaint, which included the reference prices, the actual selling price, and the quantity of mattresses sold. They said that at the time the ads appeared, the reference prices reflected the established usual selling prices of the products.
DUSK said a significant number of customers bought the mattresses at or above the reference prices displayed for the products at the time the ads were seen. They also said that, across the review period, the on-site reference price was usually equal to or higher than the reference price featured at the time the ads were seen.
DUSK said that where customers paid less than the advertised prices, that was mainly because time-limited promotional codes reduced the price. They said some promotions were advertised site-wide, were not permanently available, and applied against the reference price. They said discount codes were available across 116 days in the six-month review period, and that around 95% of discounted purchases required customers to manually enter a code at checkout
Assessment
Upheld
The ads featured various discount claims, including “END OF SUMMER SALE, UP TO 50% OFF + AN EXTRA 20% OFF EVERYTHING. USE CODE: BH20”. Each claim featured a discount code, such as “BH20”, “EXTRA15” and “PAYDAY20”, which consumers could use to apply a discount to items. The ASA considered consumers would understand the discounts to represent genuine saving against the usual selling price of the products.
The Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI) ‘Guidance for Traders on Pricing Practices’ offered practical advice to traders on consumer protection laws and associated practices. While we noted that the guidance provided a set of principles rather than statutory rules, and advertising claims were ultimately assessed under the CAP Code, we took the guidance into account when making our assessment.
The guidance stated that any specific price advantage claimed by advertisers must not be misleading or unfair. It required that advertisers who used pricing practices, which indicated a saving against another price, to be satisfied that their quoted saving was genuine and therefore not unfair. The guidance stated that advertisers should consider for how long the product was on sale at the higher price, compared to the period for which the price comparison was made, and advised that a practice was less likely to comply if a comparison was made for a materially longer period than the higher price was offered.
The guidance did not give specific advice on situations where promotions were available through using discount codes. However, we considered it was relevant to consider the discount code in the context of the consumer understanding set out above, primarily that the non-discounted price would be the usual selling price of the product.
In addition, we took into account Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) guidance – Discount and reference pricing principles: selling mattresses online. That guidance stated that traders who wished to use a reference price must offer the product for sale at or above the price for a sufficient period.
Simba Sleep Ltd provided example baskets for three different mattresses, which showed the discounted prices and crossed-out reference prices at the dates the ads were seen. We considered those examples when assessing whether the reference prices represented the usual selling prices. On 22 August 2025, the Foam 1000 Pocket Sprung Mattress (Foam Mattress) was £199.20, with the crossed-out price £249.00. Text showed that the code “BH20” had been applied. The Memory Foam 2,000 Pocket Sprung Mattress (Memory Foam Mattress) was £263.20, with the crossed-out price £329.00, and the Memory Foam 4,000 Pocket Sprung Hybrid Mattress (Hybrid Mattress) was £351.20, with the crossed-out price £439.00.
We assessed the sales data provided by DUSK. We understood that the reference prices for the products varied over the review period. We understood the reference prices for the Memory Foam Mattress and Hybrid Mattress were introduced in the week commencing 28 July 2025 (£329 and £439 respectively). Immediately before that date, the reference prices were lower, and discount codes had been available. These discount codes were available to all consumers, and were prominently displayed on the website, meaning that the actual selling price of the products had been significantly lower for both products. We understood that the mattresses were then sold at the new reference price for 11 days. A discount code was then available for seven days which applied to both mattresses. After that period, the mattresses were available at a discounted price every week until the ads were seen. We considered that the period of time that the Memory Foam Mattress and Hybrid Mattress were sold at £329 and £439 or higher respectively was insufficient to establish those prices as the usual selling prices.
We further considered the availability of discount codes across the review period. Between 24 February 2025 and 25 August 2025, discount codes were available to use on mattresses on 116 of 184 days. The codes offered 15% to 25% off the reference price and were available to all customers. That meant that the products were sold at the higher, undiscounted prices on only 37% of days. We also understood that different codes often ran back-to-back meaning the actual selling prices did not return to the higher level between promotions. Based on that data, we considered consumers were unlikely to consider that the higher, undiscounted prices were the usual selling prices of the products.
Because consumers were likely to understand the savings claims represented genuine savings against the usual selling prices of the products, and because the evidence did not substantiate the savings claims in the ads or demonstrate that the reference prices were the usual selling prices of the products, we concluded the savings claims were misleading.
The ads breached CAP Code rules 3.1 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation) and 3.17 (Prices).
Action
The ads must not appear again in the form complained of. We told DUSK (Retail) Ltd t/a DUSK to ensure that future savings claims were substantiated against the usual selling prices of products.
