New research finds that children as young as 13 may be bombarded by alcohol marketing messages from Twitter and Instagram on their smartphones. This despite Twitter’s age-gate technology which blocks direct-to-phone updates for underage users. Lead author of the research author Adam E. Barry, of Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas told Reuters Health … Read More →
Reliance on voluntary action by alcohol firms to curb drink-related harm has been a failure, according to a hard-hitting report by the Institute of Alcohol Studies. The “public health responsibility deal” unveiled during the last UK government has resulted in broken promises and too little being done to reduce alcohol problems. In the report, the … Read More →
A complaint about irresponsible alcohol advertising has been upheld by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) following a complaint made by the Youth Alcohol Advertising Council, a group of young people working with the charity Alcohol Concern. Heineken UK Ltd has been told their YouTube advert for Strongbow breached responsible advertising regulations. The Youth Alcohol Advertising … Read More →
New research shows alcohol brands continue to regularly breach industry advertising codes on Facebook and has drawn further attention to the inadequacies of the current self-regulatory system. The study found the Facebook pages of Australia’s most popular alcohol brands are filled with highly inappropriate content that glamorises and encourages excessive drinking and features crude and … Read More →
The UK’s national charity Alcohol Concern is calling for the regulation of alcohol marketing to be statutory and independent of the alcohol industry. This comes after a new report has shown how big alcohol companies cannot be trusted to promote moderate drinking. The report ‘Creating customers’ looks at how the major alcohol producers are constantly … Read More →
The Australian Advertising Standards Board (ASB) has decided that all comments on commercial Facebook pages, including comments posted by members of the public, are regarded as advertisements for the brand behind the page. This means all comments on commercial Facebook pages must comply with the Australian advertising regulations. For alcohol brands and products, the advertising … Read More →
Adweek.com writes about the launch of a free tool designed to help alcohol brands market only to people of legal drinking age on Twitter. Companies Jim Beam, Jack Daniels and MillerCoors have tested the tool for a month and now the service is open to other brands as well. Alcohol producers describe this twitter age-gate … Read More →
Last month Bacardi Limited has started a marketing campaign advocating responsible drinking. The campaign prominently features the world’s number one tennis player Raphael Nadal. The slogan for the campaign is ‘Champions drink responsible’, which might be in breach of Bacardi’s voluntary marketing regulations. As a member of the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States … Read More →