ASA upholds Laithwaites ad complaint

Direct Wines has had its knuckles rapped by the Advertising StandardsAuthority (ASA) after a TV advert for Laithwaites offering customers afree corkscrew worth £29.99 was broadcast despite the company knowing it did not have sufficient stock to meet demand.

The Laithwaites advert said: “If you would like to try 12 of my most exciting wines, they’re all in my new Laithwaites Discovery Dozen… Plus you’ll get this free lever action corkscrew worth £29.99…"

A viewer contacted the ASA to question the availability of the corkscrew, because when he took up the offer he was told none were available.

In response, Laithwaites said it based the corkscrew stock levels for the whole of 2010 on the response to its previous similar TV advertising. It explained that it changed its marketing strategy and withdrew the free corkscrew offer in April last year before deciding to reintroduce the offer in September on both TV and by direct marketing and press inserts.

Laithwaites said it revised stock level forecasts but, because of a delay loading the forecasts on to its system, a significant portion of the corkscrew stock had already been dispatched to its international business in Poland in August. Laithwaites ordered replacement stock as soon as it realised there might be a problem.

Laithwaites said that because new stock would take 18 weeks to arrive, telephone customers were informed at the point of order that the corkscrews were out of stock and would be dispatched as soon as they arrived back in stock in November.

Letters were also sent to those customers, as well as those who ordered online, explaining the situation and as a gesture of goodwill included a free delivery voucher against their next order. Laithwaites said it also offered an alternative gift of a magnum bottle of wine, but explained that, because of an error, the external agency that handled their direct response TV calls was not told about the alternative gift, although those customers were nonetheless told about the delay and the free delivery gesture.

Clearcast said it was satisfied that Laithwaites had sufficient stock to meet demand when the advert was approved at the beginning of 2010 and explained it was unaware of any problems until the complaint came to its attention.

Clearcast added that it was unfortunate the ad returned to air in September when the corkscrews were no longer available “despite Laithwaites best efforts”, but understood that steps had been taken to avoid a similar problem in future.

In upholding the complaint, with the advert having breached BCAP Code rules 3.1 (misleading advertising) and 3.28 (availability), the ASA said: “[We] noted changes to marketing plans and internal errors resulted in a shortage of the corkscrew stock and that Laithwaites were therefore unable to supply the free gift.

“We also noted, although Laithwaites took immediate action to obtain further stock, they were nonetheless aware for a significant number of weeks before the ad was broadcast, that they would not have sufficient stock to meet demand and that there would be some delay before new stock arrived.

“We understood that customers were told about the delay and offered free delivery on their next order as a gesture of goodwill, and some customers were offered an alternative free gift.

“However, we considered that, because the corkscrew was not available as claimed, the ad should not have been broadcast until Laithwaites had sufficient stock to satisfy estimated demand.

“We welcomed the steps taken by Laithwaites to help avoid a similar situation in the future, but concluded that, because they were unable to supply the gift while the ad was being broadcast, the ad was misleading.”

Alan Lodge, 23.02.2011