Melbourne, May 16 (ANI): A commercial for fast food chain Nando”s featuring a topless, pole-dancing mum who serves a chicken dinner to her children is the most complained about Australian advertisement of the decade.
The ad, in which a stripper gyrates topless in front of a male nightclub patron before sitting down to eat Nando”s with her family, prompted 350 complaints to the Advertising Standards Bureau when it first aired in 2007.
The amount of complaints was the most the bureau had received for a commercial since 1998, reports News.com.au
An ad for Mentos Ice chewing gum was the second most complained about commercial of the decade. The ad features a man whose nipples extend after eating a mint.
The Advanced Medical Institute”s billboards and a confronting anti-smoking campaign featuring a woman”s rotting mouth also came up high on the list.
The Advertising Standards Bureau, however, dismissed all complaints about the ads. (ANI)
Furore over Burger King’s ‘raunchy’ sandwich ad
Washington, July 1 (ANI): A print advertisement of Burger King’s sandwich in Singapore has come under fire because of its “distasteful” and unappetizing references to oral sex.
The ad for the “BK Super Seven Incher” shows the “mind-blowing” sandwich near the open mouth of a wide-eyed, red-lipsticked woman accompanied by the suggestive tagline: “It’ll blow your mind away.”
“Fill your desire for something long, juicy and flame-grilled,” Fox News quoted the ad as saying further.
The ad is a limited time promotion in Singapore-a society known around the world for its strict government controls of social conduct.
And now advertising experts have said that the ad leaves little to the imagination and should be discontinued.
Mark Duffy, a blogger and an advertising copywriter at a major New York City firm, said that the advertisement was among the “worst” he had ever seen in more than 17 years of his experience.
“I’ve seen a lot of sexual innuendo ads and this is about the worst, especially for something as mainstream as Burger King. I was a little repulsed by it. It’s really misogynistic to women and it’s also unappetizing,” said Duffy.
Duffy said that the woman’s face in the advertisement appeared to have been retouched to make it look like a doll, and that the American cheese on the sandwich seemed a little too white.
“It’s outlandish. They obviously didn’t hire a top-notch food photographer,” he said.
Duffy, who called on Burger King to terminate the ad, said: “It’s really distasteful on the appetite level and on the social level. The ad pretty much speaks for itself. How much more do they have to spell it out for you?”
Lauren Kuziner, a spokeswoman for Burger King, said that the campaign was produced by a local Singaporean agency, and not by the company’s U.S. advertising firm, Crispin Porter plus Bogusky.
“Burger King Corp. values and respects all of its guests. This print ad is running to support a limited time promotion in the Singapore market and is not running in the U.S. or any other markets. The campaign is supported by the franchisee in Singapore and has generated positive consumer sales around this limited time product offer in that market,” said Kuziner in a statement.
He, however, refused to identify the Singapore-based firm, and did not respond to requests for comment on whether Burger King had received complaints in connection with the ad. (ANI)