A poster advert for an artificial grass supplier in Failsworth has been ruled as being offensive and degrading by the Advertising Standards Authority after just one complaint by a member of the public
The poster for Great Grass, an artificial grass supplier, seen in July 2024, featured an image of a woman’s torso and upper legs.
She was wearing flesh-coloured underwear and held a potted plant in front of her crotch. She held scissors in her other hand. Headline text stated, “No trimming needed! [wink emoji
The Company said the ad had been on display for several months and had therefore been seen by hundreds of thousands of people.
They believed that, because there had been only one complaint, most of those who saw it were not offended by the ad. They said they had in fact received 47 positive comments about it and believed the ad generated business because people found it amusing and memorable.
They also said they believed it was wrong to assume that the person featured in the ad was a woman when it could equally be a man or a transgender person. They said it made no mention of women or sex, nor did it show any obvious female sexual features.
However the Advertising Standards Authority thought otherwise and in a ruling published this morning said that
The model was dressed only in flesh-coloured underwear, which we considered was intended to suggest that she was nude. The image was cropped from the chest down, so her face could not be seen. The model held a pot plant in front of her crotch, with scissors posed as if to trim the plant. We considered that those elements made the model’s groin area the dominant focus of the ad.
“The ad must not appear again in the form complained of. We told Great Grass MCR Ltd t/a Great Grass to ensure their future ads were socially responsible and did not cause serious or widespread offence, including by featuring a harmful gender stereotype by objectifying women.”
