A Just Eat advertisement on Facebook, which showcased McDonald’s burgers, has been banned by the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for not adequately preventing exposure to children under 16.
The paid-for ad, which appeared on 15 December 2023, prompted a complaint from Bite Back 2030, a youth anti-junk food campaign group.
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The group argued that the promotion of high-fat, salt or sugar (HFSS) products to minors violated the marketing code.
The ad read: “Fancy a McMuffin in the morning? McNugget for lunch? Or a big night in with a Big Mac? Get them delivered right here.”
Despite Just Eat’s use of age restrictions to block under-18s from viewing the ad, the ASA criticised the company for not considering interest-based factors that could have excluded those likely to be under 16.
The also ASA stated that the interest-based targeting factors had not been used to exclude groups of people more likely to be under 16 from the target audience of the ad.
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By GlobalDataJust Eat responded by stating that the classification of their products was determined by McDonald’s, acknowledging that the meat variants of the Big Mac and McMuffin were indeed HFSS.
They targeted the ad at individuals over 18 using Meta’s age targeting tools and provided data from Facebook to show that no under-18s were shown the ad.
However, the ASA pointed out that Just Eat had not used interest-based targeting to further narrow the audience, which is a requirement under the CAP code for HFSS product advertisements.
The UK code of non-broadcast advertising and direct and promotional marketing, known as the CAP code, mandates that such ads must not be directed at people under 16. CAP guidance suggests that relying solely on age data is insufficient due to the potential for age misreporting and device sharing among different age groups.
As a result, the ASA has determined that the ad breached its marketing code and has banned it.
The ASA stated: “We concluded that Just Eat had not taken sufficient care to ensure that the ad, which promoted several HFSS products, was not directed at individuals aged under 16 years. The ad therefore breached the code.
“The ad breached CAP code (Edition 12) rule 15.18 (HFSS product and placement).”
