Ad Standards Bureau is toothless
On Sunday I noticed that another batch of adjudications had appeared on the Advertising Standards Bureau website (they haven’t discovered RSS feeds yet, so you have to keep an eye out for them). It made for depressing reading as it demonstrated just how toothless the watchdog is when it comes to maverick advertisers.
The self regulation system may work for big advertisers, but those seeking notoriety can do so seemingly without facing consequences.
Take Wicked Campers, for instance. This firm hires vans to backpackers. Its low rent marketing strategy is based on being tacky. It extends from the messages on the vans to their ads.
The most recent complaints included an ad suggesting customers should “snog an aboriginal”, messages about gay sex painted on one of the vehicles and sexually suggestive images of animals.
The problem for the ASB being twofold. First, the company changes its ads all the time. So every time, the ASB rules that it’s been in breach, it has already moved on to something similarly offensive.
But second, there are no sanctions the ASB can take anyway. And it’s obvious that the company knows it from the flippant tone of its responses to the watchdog suggesting that complainants have dirty minds.
While the fear of embarrassment is enough to self regulate major brands, for those seeking controversy, an ASB ruling only helps. When it ruled against an Advanced Medical Institute TV ad, the company’s PR agency emailed me a copy of the ad, in the hope I’d post it online. It’s not as if the ASB levies fines or any other tangible penalty.
Similarly, the ASB also found against the would-be producers of a movie about a man and woman auctioning their virginity. The offence came when they used an image of the Virgin Mary with a penis drawn on her forehead.
And although the ASB ruled against that, the image is still prominent on the company’s website.
And this is the big questions. When a brand doesn’t give a fuck, how can self regulation be effective? I’m not sure it can.
Tim Burrowes
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large. He returned to Mumbrella as Publisher in January 2025
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While no system is perfect, the self-regulatory system developed by the Australian Association of national Advertisers and administered by the ASB has worked effectively to ensure that marketing communications does meet community expectations. We need to put this in perspective – the fact is that no brand owner has consistently flouted the system and consequently been able to build and sustain a successful brand nationally, which suggests that the self-regulatory system is working well in the main. The purpose of the system is not to eliminate all controversy, or to curb freedom of commercial expression, and clearly some advertisers will engage in edgy behaviour to garner controversy; the question is will that controversy be rewarded by commercial success. Traditional media owners need to play a role by not giving such advertisers the publicity they seek, and when the advertiser needs third parties to help take their product to market – such as agencies and retailers – these third parties also have a role to play in ensuring that these marketing techniques are not rewarded.
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“We need to put this in perspective – the fact is that no brand owner has consistently flouted the system and consequently been able to build and sustain a successful brand nationally, which suggests that the self-regulatory system is working well in the main”
Hmm, I am sorry, Scott, but Wikid campers have been doing exactly that, from my perspective. They have been around for a while now, and while the AANA may release condemantion I can honestly say nothing appears to have changed with their general advertising strategy. If anything, they have gotten more and more crude… anything to get a reaction..
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Wicked’s campaign is as much a positive deterrent to sales as anything else.
Who would want to drive around in a van that shouts stupidity is beyond me.
What a lost opportunity – over time they have deviated from attracting attention via interesting graffiti to crude comments. If the AANA can not act, I’m not sure who can?
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Of course the ASB is worthless – as a marketer at a big advertiser, everyone knows the only reason it exists is as a PR exercise to stop the govt regulating the industry
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