ASA Puts Brakes On Daihatsu Advertising

Advertising the performance capabilities of a car without encouraging dangerous driving is a tricky one. Daihatsu found itself on the wrong side of the line this week with an advert in the national press that prompted a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority.

The ad in question, for the Sirion 1.3 SL featured a picture of the car in motion, with part of the background blurred. A headline stated “Quick enough to see off a 1.5 litre VW Golf GTi” and then stated “The 100 bhp Sirion 1.3 SL…will exhilarate you with 0-62 mph in 9.6 seconds.” The complainant objected that the advert encourage competitive driving in public.

The advertisers’ defence was that the advert was made up of an endorsement from Autocar magazine and comparative information about their car’s engine capacity, fuel consumption, emissions and cost, compared to the VW. Daihatsu did not comment specifically on the actual complaint. The ASA was not convinced by this argument, and decided that the headline did encourage “anti-social driving”. Daihatsu was told to change its approach for all future advertisements.

ASA: 020 7580 5555 www.asa.org.uk

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