Bomb threat over ‘offensive’ weight loss ad

IT IS not the first advertising billboard in which a company has used the image of a svelte, bikini-clad model to sell its wares and it probably won’t be the last.

But something about this poster for Protein World diet supplements has struck a collective raw nerve.

The company is facing a massive backlash over its billboard campaign — including vandalised posters, a petition, a protest rally and even a bomb threat.

Campaigners launched a scathing attack on the protein supplement company after the advert — which features a toned model posing with the slogan ‘Are you beach body ready?’ — began appearing on the London Underground three weeks ago.

The ‘body shaming’ campaign has seen many of its posters defaced with feminist slogans, more than 50,000 people sign a petition to have them removed and a demonstration planned for this weekend in protest.

But yesterday the company’s marketing boss claimed the firm is ‘just trying to make the nation healthier’. richard Staveley, Protein World’s head of global marketing, added: ‘It’s been a brilliant campaign for us and I don’t see us changing anything dramatically any time soon.’

On ITV’s Good Morning Britain yesterday, presenter Susanna reid, 44, admitted that, like many women, she finds the advert ‘a little bit anxiety-inducing’.

And the Advertising Standards Authority confirmed it had received 277 complaints, with many commenting that ‘the advert is offensive, irresponsible and harmful because it promotes an unhealthy body image’.

Posters have been vandalised with feminist messages such as ‘Your body is not a commodity’. Photographs of the amended signs have gone viral online.

Despite the controversy, earlier in the week the company announced on Twitter it had made sales of £1 million and attracted 20,000 new customers in just four days following the advert’s release.

Protein World has taken a strong stance on social media during the furore and has posted blunt replies to complaints on Twitter, including ‘why make your insecurities our problem’ and ‘grow up’.

The company’s CeO and founder, Arjun Seth, has even branded the people defacing his adverts ‘terrorists’, ‘irrational and extremist’.

Speaking on Good Morning Britain, Mr Staveley said his company had received a series of threats, including one to bomb its head office.

He said: ‘ First, we’ve been inundated, as you’ve probably seen from our Twitter feed and Facebook, of people defacing adverts, ripping them down and climbing over rail tracks to graffiti them.

‘That’s criminal behaviour. I think that’s quite extreme behaviour.

‘We’ve actually had threats on our head office, physical, violent threats. We had a bomb threat.’

More than 52,300 people have signed a petition demanding the adverts are removed. Demonstrators plan to congregate at London’s Hyde Park on Saturday for a protest dubbed ‘Taking back the beach’.

On a Facebook page calling on people to attend the demonstration, a post reads: ‘ The idea that your body should be hidden away if it doesn’t meet these bizarrely specific requirements . . . I’m over it.’ When Miss reid asked Mr Staveley about claims the posters make women feel anxious, he replied: ‘ We’re advertising our weight-loss collection. That’s what millions of people are aspiring to do in time for their summer holiday — to lose a bit of weight, feel a bit healthier and get fitter. It’s not a new concept.’

He confirmed the model in the picture, Australian renee Somerfield, 23, had achieved her enviable physique using Protein World products, and denied the image had been retouched or altered.

A spokesman for Transport for London said the adverts will be taken down from today — not because of the controversy, but because they have ‘come to the end of their natural three-week advertising lifespan’.

Sioned Quirke, a specialist dietitian based in South Wales, said: ‘Some people do find that increasing their protein intake can aid weight loss.

‘But generally, taking a supplement or diet pill will not do all the work for you.

‘Also, these kinds of products are not regulated or monitored, so you can never be 100 per cent sure what is actually in them.’

‘Your insecurities aren’t our problem’