ASA Warns Happy Tiger Bingo over Youthful Character in Advertisement
LISTEN TO THIS ARTICLE:The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), the UK monitoring agency, has announced it has warned gaming operator Happy Tiger Bingo over the contents of one of its advertisements. This followed one complaint to the ASA that the advertisement appeared to feature a young adult under the age of 25 when the promotion was shown in October last year.
The advert from Happy Tiger Bingo featured a young man, described as a postgraduate student, giving a positive testimonial about the gaming operator. ASA rules in the UK state that gaming operators are prohibited from using actors that have the appearance of being under 25 years old in a gambling environment or acting in an adolescent way.
Happy Tiger Bingo and Clearcast, an agency that pre-approves advertisements, confirmed that the actor in question was 25 years old when the advertisement was made, and his postgraduate title should have given the impression he was above the typical age of being a student. Clearcast did concede that the title of postgraduate may have given viewers of the advertisement the impression that the character was of typical student age and, therefore, under 25.
Related: ASA Upholds Complaint over Betfred Advert on the Roku Channel
Character in Advert Appeared Youthful
The ASA found that the main character in the advertisement appeared to look under 25, and additionally, the agency felt the character used language associated with youth and did not show the maturity someone over 25 may display.
The ASA acknowledged that the individual featured in the ad was 25 years old at the time of filming. However, we considered that he had a youthful appearance. We noted that he appeared self-conscious and often used filler words, such as “obviously,” “like,” and “so yeah.” We considered that viewers would associate his speaking style and body language with youth and immaturity, and along with his youthful appearance, that was likely to give the impression that he was under the age of 25.
This is the second ruling against a gaming operator by the ASA this year and follows the recent judgment against Buzz Bingo.
Following its decision, the ASA has given a clear warning to Happy Tiger Bingo, stating that any future advertisements from the gambling company must not include anyone who appears to be under 25 through appearance, occupation, and behavior. The advertising regulator has also prohibited the bingo company from running the ad campaign in its current form.
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