Carlsberg’s Stuart Pearce beer ad banned

Carlsberg has fallen foul of the Advertising Standard Authority (ASA) after releasing an advert that showed former England footballer Stuart Pearce deliver a crate of beer to workers on a building site.

A clip of the advert in question

The advert, which was published on Trade Point’s You Tube page, shows former England footballer Stuart Pearce arriving at a construction site with an unmarked wooden crate which is revealed to contain multiple crates of Carlsberg beer.

On screen text reads bulk in red text, with a downwards arrow, and underneath this beer in green, with an upwards arrow – in reference to a football substitution – followed by the text “If Carlsberg did substitutions”.

Charity Alcohol concern complained to the ASA claiming that the video was irresponsible because it showed a large quantity of alcohol being delivered to a building site and therefore “linked alcohol with the use of potentially dangerous machinery”.

It also claimed the ad was irresponsible because it encouraged excessive drinking and implied that drinking alcohol was a key component of the success of a social event.

Carlsberg responded to the stating that they believed it was “clear that the building site was used to receiving bulk orders and that it was therefore not unwise or unsafe to deliver a crate of beer to the site”.

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It added that the video showed no further use of machinery after the beer was delivered and that this was made clear by the fact that the workers were shown leaving the site with their packs of Carlsberg unopened.

“They believed there was no suggestion that Carlsberg was opened or consumed on site or that any work continued after the delivery was made”, it said.

The watchdog dismissed two of the charity’s accusations, that the ad encouraged excessive drinking and implied that drinking alcohol was a key component of the success of a social event, but upheld its third complaint regarding the linking of alcohol with the use of heavy machinery.

“We considered that the delivery of a large crate of Carlsberg which was then distributed among the workers, even though none was shown to be opened and drunk, linked alcohol with a building site”, ruled the ASA.

“Regardless of the possible further link with potentially dangerous machinery, we considered that a building site would be an unsafe and unwise location in which to consume alcohol. Because the ad linked alcohol with that location, we concluded that it breached the Code.”

The ASA banned the advert in its current form.