Brands that have been caught fibbing

There’s a fine line between exaggerating the truth and being deliberately misleading. In the world of advertising, many brands are guilty of both.

Kellogg’s, for example, was recently hit with a ban from telling customers that it’s Special K cereal is “full of goodness” and “nutritious”. While Kellogg’s argued the cereal contained vitamin B2, which is good for the skin, the ASA said that didn’t mean it was generally good for your health.



Nurofen has also been guilty of misleading customers. Painkillers target pain; that much is obvious. But Nurofen promoted the idea that certain painkillers could target certain areas of the body, in particular pertaining to their Nurofen Back and Joint Pain. The ASA banned the advert and the whole fiasco has sparked a crackdown on pharmaceutical brands misleadingly marketing ‘targeted’ painkillers.



Another particularly bad example is VitaminWater, a brand that tried to market its drink as a healthy alternative to fizzy drinks. Their tagline “vitamins + water = all you need conspicuously neglected one thing – the eight teaspoons of sugar per bottle. The company now uses sweeteners and markets the product as such after a complaint from the Center for Science in the Public Interest in the US.

Nesquik landed themselves in hot water last year when they promoted their chocolate milkshake as a “healthy start to the day” – something which it definitely isn’t. Laden with sugar, the drink is one of the unhealthiest things to start the day with. Nesquik’s defense was that the 20.2g of sugar in each portion mostly comes from the lactose naturally present in milk, but nonetheless they were forced to remove the “healthy start to the day” strapline. Although, as you can see below, they’re still being a bit cheeky with their advertising and certainly pushing the boundaries as far as they can legally get away with.



Pom Wonderful – a drink made from pomegranates – recently found itself in hot water over some pretty outlandish claims. The Federal Trade Commission – the body that protects consumers in the US – ruled that they had deceptively marketed their products. Some of the things they previously claimed the drink could treat include heart disease and prostate cancer.

So basically, don't lie about your product. Because you will get found out and your brand will suffer badly as a result.