ITC Flooded With Complaints Over ‘Dog Breath’ TV Ad
The ITC has received a record number of complaints about the new ‘dog breath’ TV commercial for Wrigley’s X-cite chewing gum.
The advertising watchdog has received almost 600 complaints about the ad, which features a man waking up on the sofa after an apparently heavy night out. As he wakes up a dog’s paw comes out of his mouth and he appears to regurgitate a scruffy grey dog.
The man eats a piece of chewing gum and the dog disappears just in time for the man’s girlfriend to give him a kiss. The ad culminates with the strapline: “Avoid dog breath.”
The commercial, created by Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, has attracted floods of complaints from parents concerned that it is distressing their children. A number of adults have also complained that the ad is “disgusting” and that it has made them “feel ill”.
A spokeswoman for the ITC today confirmed that the advertising agency has voluntary moved the commercial to a slot after the 9pm watershed. However, she said that the number of complaints was continually rising.
Over the last few weeks the ITC has been inundated with complaints about controversial TV ads. Last month the watchdog upheld 318 complaints against a national television ad campaign for Take A Break magazine after viewers claimed that it degraded the elderly (see ITC Upholds Complaints Against H Bauer’s Take A Break).
ITC: 0207 306 7743 www.itc.org.uk
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