Subway spokesman and occasional thin guy Jared Fogle may soon be out of work thanks to a new FTC rule banning commercial testimonials that warn “results not typical” or “individual results may vary.” Under the new rule, marketers using, say, body builders to advertise weight loss pills are also going to have to show an average lardass whose results might be more typical. You can guess how advertisers are reacting to the change…
The revisions have drawn sharp criticism from product manufacturers, advertising agencies and trade groups who say it is the “aspirational” theme of their ads that motivates consumers to purchase their goods. Show less than the ultimate achievement, they say, and consumers are less likely to buy.
Translation: Easily deceived consumers wouldn’t buy useless products if they knew they were useless.
“For a good part of the last decade, we have noticed a problem, particularly with consumer testimonials,” said Richard Cleland, assistant director of the FTC’s division of advertising practices. “The use of consumer testimonials had become almost a safe harbor for companies as long as they threw in some sort of disclaimer about results not being typical.”
The rules are undergoing a final review, after which they will likely be adopted. Late night and daytime advertising will never be the same!
Federal Trade Commission’s plan to change rules on ad endorsements, testimonials worries marketers [Chicago Tribune]
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Speaking of odd names, how about ZZYZX road?
It exists! I was there… see picture: [tinyurl.com]
Wow, that’s awesome! Truth in advertising at last? Yay FTC.
I applaud the FTC’s efforts. This appears to be a common sense approach to stupid false advertisements. Score one for the FTC.
Personally, I’d be more excited if this had some teeth to go after scummy affiliate marketers. Broadcast advertising is fairly regulated and stations have their own guidelines (some strict, some not. Nickolodean for example has INCREDIBLY strict standards on toy ads).
Affiliate marketers for the most part don’t care anything about how their products are advertised and if this let us go after the companies who were paying these affiliates, they would make more of an effort to clean things up. Think Acai and colon cleansing products that have been making the rounds lately.
It really doesn’t matter when it all comes down to it. All that will happen is a stupid little disclaimer that you can barely see for 10 seconds in tiny white lettering on a white back ground will say results may vary, or this is not the typical weight loss, our company paid the liposuction have a nice day. It’s all the same garbage day in and day out. nothing will change, it never does, the ad agencies just find loopholes.
What does this do to an infomercial like p90x which doesn’t make ridiculous claims like “exercise for 5 minutes a week and take 10 inches off your waist guaranteed!!!”. But for proper results, you have to workout hard and exercise. Most people probably won’t actually stick to the intense regimen required to get the real results of the program. How do they monitor this and enforce it?
Diet and exercise (together, not independently) are pretty much sure-fire ways to lose weight. I’d say they fall in the “typical results” portion of the spectrum.
The fact that most people suck and would rather just diet, and sit on their ass all day doesn’t mean Jared didn’t have it right.
That Subway sucks, is another matter entirely. If you live in NYC, there’s no reason not to go to a deli where the meat is at least freshly sliced.
“Dj Butcher
6:17 AM on Sun Mar 22 2009 Imagine a world where people were actually required to tell the truth… “
Dare we hope? Nah, that would be a boring world.
I’ll never forget where I was when I heard the news about Jared’s Law.
I wonder how the wording of the law is going to affect this. For example, the average consumer probably buys something like the P-90X workout program, and then DOESN’T FOLLOW it, so they don’t get the results. But if you do follow it carefully, you get some results, maybe not quite like the guys in the ad, but it is a killer workout for 90 days… So it doesn’t really seem like they’re misleading you, just getting your hopes up about your own self-discipline.
Doesn’t everyone know that Jared had his stomach stapled? It’s nowhere to be found in the literature, but neither are the thousands of lawsuits and arbitration cases against Doctor’s Associates and Subway. It was done to make sure Jared had the best results! Fred DeLuca is a deceitful punk and a billionaire because stupid people keep buying his franchises and going broke. Not to mention several other franchising entities who use deceitful advertising to sell their wares and their franchisees down the river!!! See more at bloodyfranchise.wordpress.com
This is great! It’s about damned time that this problem got addressed. One of the biggest abuses is in the weight loss products. I spent months working out, eating right, and depriving myself of a lot of my favorite foods to lose 40 pounds. It’s offensive to me to see commercials showing someone who obviously didn’t use the advertised product talking about how successful they have been. I did all of this with no help from any pills or supplements. The secret weight loss is to get off your lazy ass and take your goal seriously.