Asda ad banned after Tesco complaint

Posted by Michael Bond on 22nd Sep 10

The Advertising Standards Authority has told Asda that an advert it has produced, claiming many of its products were being sold at lower prices than its competitors, must be removed, and not released again in its present format, because it is ambiguous.

Tesco complained to the ASA about the ad saying it could not work out whether Asda was referring to lower prices compared to its own produce or lower prices compared to other grocers. The advertisement is entitled ‘the big Asda Rollback’.

In the ad Asda claims to sell 4,834 products at a lower price than rivals, Tesco. Tesco said that in January, when it conducted its own price comparison survey, it did not find that the figure could be substantiated. Asda also claimed that its prices were lower than those at any other supermarket. Tesco again took issue with the claim saying that Asda had only compared prices with a single segment of the whole sector.

Asda has defended the ad claiming that it would be obvious to anyone reading the word rollback that the price comparison was being made to the grocer’s own stock. It added that in referring to lower prices on all products in its stores, week in week out, it made no reference to any of its rivals.

In recent years the ASA has had to ban a number of ads by both Asda and Tesco; mostly for claims that one grocer is selling produce at a lower price than its rival. The ads have usually been banned because the claims are misleading or cannot be substantiated.

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