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London (pte048/30.03.2005/15:45) - A television advert for the new KFC Mini Chicken Fillet Burger http://www.kfc.com has been banned today after advertising watchdogs ruled it had misled viewers about the food's size. As the Media Guardian http://www.mediaguardian.co.uk reports, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) http://www.asa.org.uk upheld five complaints about the advert after examining the burgers for itself, by purchasing three of the burgers in a central London KFC restaurant. "There was a difference in the size and presentation to the advertised product," said the ASA in its ruling. "We noted that the bun shown in the advertisement was significantly thicker than the burgers we purchased; that there was more filling and the lettuce was a different type."
In the KFC advert, a group of people were shown holding Mini Chicken Fillet Burgers at a railway station, with one burger-less man serenading a woman with one, asking if he could "have a bite". A close-up of the burger in the woman's hand sparked complaints that the real thing was much smaller than the on-screen sandwich. "One viewer thought the product was shown to be the size of a standard burger, another said the advertisement showed the burger to be at least twice its correct size," the ASA said. In its defence, KFC said that the burgers used for the commercial had been cooked in a KFC store that day and were "within KFC's standard range of dimensions for the burger". It also said that the woman in the advert may have had small hands, although it said she had not been cast for her small hands, "as hand size did not constitute part of the casting brief."
However, the ASA ruled that hand size was not a material factor for its ruling, although it could have contributed to viewers getting a misleading impression. "Advertisers are permitted to present their products in a favourable light, but not in a way likely to mislead viewers," the authority said. "Even though the product was called a Mini Chicken Fillet Burger, we do not think this was sufficient to alert consumers to the fact that product was smaller than appeared in the advertisement. We believed the visuals were likely to mislead viewers over the actual size."
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