Research did not back up gravy claims, says ad regulator

The adverts, which promoted Knorr gravy granules, contained headlines that said "unbeatable taste vs Bisto". The ads contained further text that said Knorr's gravy had recorded "unbeatable scores for taste, appearance, consistency and aroma" in testing, the ASA ruling said. One of the adverts claimed Knorr gravy recorded "unbeatable scores" over "main competitors", the ASA said.

Blind taste tests of gravy products carried out with chefs had in fact found that most chefs preferred a third gravy product over Knorr or Bisto, the ruling said. Chefs were asked what factors about the products had influenced their decision, but were not asked to rank the factors in importance, the ruling said.

Premier Foods Group, which owns the Bisto brand, successfully argued that the comparisons made in the adverts had been misleading and could not be proven.

"Because the survey did not show that Knorr was unbeatable versus its main competitors and we were unable to ascertain whether it was unbeatable in the individual categories stated in both ads we concluded that [the] ads ... were misleading," ASA said in its ruling.

"On this point [the] ads ... breached [the] CAP Code," it said.

The CAP code says companies must not omit 'material information' from adverts and have documentary proof to back up the claims it makes.

The ruling concerned two print adverts which appeared in food magazines. They breached the UK Code of Non-broadcast Advertising, Sales Promotion and Direct Marketing (CAP code). The CAP code is a set of rules that organisations volunteer to follow in order to meet the requirements of European laws, including the EU Comparative Advertising Directive.

Unilever, which owns the Knorr brand, must change the adverts before they can be republished, ASA said. In their current form the ads did not accurately inform consumers of the results of a survey of the attitude of chefs to its product, the ASA said.

"We told Unilever to ensure that their ads accurately reflected the results of survey data and included means by which consumers could verify comparisons," the ASA said in its ruling.

Small text within the adverts referenced Partner Research between January and April 2010, the ruling said. Partner Research is an independent research company which surveyed the chefs, the ruling said.

The adverts did not make it clear how consumers could authenticate the comparisons made in the ads, Premier Foods had argued, according to the ruling. the ASA agreed and said that it breached a part of the CAP code that requires companies to provide details about the marketing organisation.

"Because the ads did not make clear how readers could verify the comparison, we concluded that they were misleading," the ASA said.

"On this point [the] ads ... breached [the] CAP Code," the ASA said.

The ASA did not uphold a third complaint from Premier Foods. It had argued that the adverts' reference to "Bisto" was misleading as it was a wider brand not specific to gravy granules, the ruling said.

"We understood from the response provided by Knorr that Bisto Gravy Granules was the most equivalent product to Knorr's standard gravy product, and had approximately a 50 per cent share of the trade market," the ASA ruling said.

"We considered that it was therefore likely to be understood by a trade audience that that was the Bisto product being compared in the ad. We concluded the ads were not misleading on this point," the ASA said.

From 1 March 2011 the CAP Code was extended to cover marketing communications on an organisation's own website and in other non-paid-for online space under a company's control, such as social media sites.