Plans to relax the rules on product placement in TV programmes would be a “stealth advertising tactic too far,” according to the National Consumer Council. The watchdog warns that the proposals would blur the distinction between advertising and programme content.
Product placement ads, where manufacturers pay to have their particular product used in particular TV shows and films, are common in US programmes.
They are generally banned in all European countries, except Austria, unless an imported show is being aired. Desperate Housewives and 24 were among the popular US series that pioneered successful product placement.
According to the European Commission, however, the discrepancy is leading to legal uncertainty and is putting the European industry at a disadvantage in comparison with the US market. In December it therefore set out proposals to relax the rules, explicitly defining product placement for the first time, and setting the use of the ads in a clear legal framework.
Shortly after, UK telecommunications regulator Ofcom launched a consultation on the issue. The consultation period ends today.
According to Ofcom, developments in the television market, audience fragmentation and video on demand have challenged the value of traditional spot-advertising. Future funding of programming is therefore a legitimate concern to commercial broadcasters, and product placement, cautiously introduced, may be the solution.
The NCC does not agree.
“We recognise that changes in the broadcast sector and in the way consumers use digital technology raise uncertainties about the future funding of television, but product placement is neither an acceptable, nor practical answer to those challenges. It is a stealth advertising tactic too far,” said Sue Dibb, author of NCC’s submission to Ofcom.
“Prominent product placement has scant support from the public and, on US experience, will boost traditional advertising spend by less than one percent hardly a viable alternative source of television funding,” she added.
According to the NCC, evidence from Ofcom’s own research shows there is little public support to move beyond the existing rules allowing unpaid-for ‘props’ to add realism to programmes.
The NCC’s submission also points out that product placement would blur the 50-year old line between advertising and programme material, reaffirmed last year in Ofcom’s new Broadcasting Code. In the watchdog’s view, for Ofcom to allow product placement would be to sacrifice its own broadcasting and consumer protection principles for no significant benefits for viewers, broadcasters or advertisers.
