Heineken has reached the parts few advertisers can by successfully challenging a complaint that its latest TV ad encouraged excessive drinking and linked booze to sexual success.
The ad, by Wieden & Kennedy Amsterdam, followed a man’s journey around a city after he had picked up a number of business cards left by a woman on the seat of a taxi.
The first stop was a salon, where he is handed a bottle of Heineken in an ice bucket and then receives a shave. He then visits other venues, including a racecourse where he takes part in a race, a bar where is handed another beer, and a further bar where he meets the original woman from the taxi. They then enter a private room, and proceed to travel over the city on a wire.
But the Youth Alcohol Advertising Council took exception to the TV spot and rifled off a compalint to the Advertising Standards Authority. The organisation claimed the ad encouraged excessive drinking, linked alcohol with “unwise and unsafe” physical activities, and linked it with sexual success.
Heineken, however, maintained the main character was not shown consuming alcohol, that the racing scene was “highly fantastical”, and that there was no suggestion of seduction.
The ASA agreed and rejected all four complaints made by the Youth Alcohol Advertising Council.
In its ruling, the ASA said: “While the ads suggested that a couple of drinks may have been consumed across the entire evening, we considered there was no implication of drinking to excess and no suggestion that any of the characters were intoxicated.”
RT ashishkhera: Heineken defies booze sex claim http://t.co/BxJg5KrPfm #digitalmarketing #advertising
— Charlie McKelvey (DM_editor) Mar…