Ritika Janiya
One of the main food delivery services, Just Eat, recently fell into hot water after one of their Facebook advertisements had to be banned for not following the rules. An ad posted on the company’s profile got some rather scathing reviews due to a McDonald’s burger not being careful enough to not target children under 16, therefore being removed by the ASA.
The ad formed part of a push to get more customers to order McDonald’s food through Just Eat, with straplines such as “Fancy a McMuffin in the morning? McNuggets for lunch? Or a Big night in with a Big Mac? Get them delivered right here.” Over which are lavished the words “Get them delivered right here” is an animated and seemingly morphing image of McNuggets, before logos for Just Eat and McDonald’s inch their way across the screen.
The advert, seen on 15 December 2023, was brought to the attention of Bite Back 2030, a young people’s campaign that confronts junk food marketing. They challenged it by submitting a complaint to the ASA, alleging that the advertisement promoted high-fat, high-salt, or high-sugar foods and targeted children. Of course, the big question was whether the ad was being shown to kids by its choice of media or how it was presented.
Response from Just Eat included explaining that they had ensured such advertisement reached only those aged 18 or over—apparently the use of Meta’s age-targeting tools on Facebook is designed to prevent those under 18 from seeing such content. Just Eat argued this was enough to ensure the ad would not be seen by an under-18 audience, and that if an under-18 did see the ad then it was likely their Facebook account had been registered with an incorrect age.
However, the ASA wasn’t mollified by the explanation put forth by Just Eat. According to the rules set down by the Committee of Advertising Practice, one cannot target people below 16 directly for any advertising regarding HFSS products. Put simply, it is up to the advertisers to take due care while selecting places and methods for their advertisement to ensure that children do not get access to such ads.
The ASA noted that Just Eat had actually used age targeting to at least try and exclude under 18s from seeing the ad. However, quite rightly, they again noted that age targeting alone rarely proves completely successful: interest-based targeting needed to be taken into account too, which would help to weed out groups more likely to consist of under 16s, such as fans of games or shows popular among kids.
In their ruling, ASA said, “We concluded that Just Eat had not taken sufficient care to ensure that the ad, which promoted several HFSS products, was not directed at individuals aged under 16 years. The ad therefore breached the code.”
This means that the Just Eat ad breached the rules, and the ruling is to pull it within the shortest time possible. The ASA added that the advertisement could not appear again in its current form.
Just Eat expressed their disappointment over the judgment. They said that they filtered the ad to appear only for those over 18 and believe that, therefore, reasonable steps were taken to prevent the ad from appearing to younger age groups. On the other hand, fairly, they also gave an assurance that in future they would make sure their ads are fully in line with the advertising guidelines.
This incident is an indication of how crucial it is for companies to be cautious in their every activity when they are advertising something that might be seen as an unhealthy product, particularly at the expense of protecting the young audience. For apparent reasons, the HFSS product advertising regulations are stringent to avoid the inculcation of unhealthy eating habits among children.
It is quite not the first time that advertisement practices have fallen under scrutiny right from the birth of social media and digital advertisement. Things go out of hand as to whom the ad is going to display with highly plausible targeting tools across platforms like Facebook, but then, even those tools need wisely using, as per this case.
For Just Eat, they’ll need to be a little more vigilant now to ensure that their advertisements don’t inadvertently slip by and get placed in front of the wrong audience. While this advertisement may have been created to entice adults into ordering up a tasty treat, the rules about junk food are very clear: children shouldn’t be in the target zone.
This is a situation in which, above all, it once again stresses the idea that advertising must be responsible, and businesses always need to have in mind how they are going to reach the audience. For Just Eat, it is a serious lesson learned but one that will, hopefully, lead to more meaningful, compliant advertising in the future.
