Too Northern for TV? Supermarket dubs over model’s voice on clothes advert

IT IS the sort of high-profile role that most models can only dream of – fronting a multimillion-pound global advertising campaign for a giant of the high street.

But although Charlotte Wiggins is the new face of Tesco’s F&F clothing line, her Merseyside accent was apparently deemed unsuitable for the TV ads.

Instead, an actress was drafted in to dub over the seductively whispered tagline ‘I only came in for ice cream’ in a posh voice.

Friends say Charlotte was ‘astonished’ to find her voice had been dropped from the final cut.

But there is some compensation, as she was paid a reputed sixfigure fee for her role. One pal aid last night: ‘Perhaps someone didn’t feel she was posh enough.

‘Charlotte saw the funny side and joked modestly that she was paid a lot of money and only had one line, but must have blown it.’

Born in Liverpool and raised in Rainford, near St Helens, Charlotte was spotted at the age of 16 when on a school trip to The Clothes Show Live Birmingham. She was signed up by Select Model Agency, which counts Pixie Lott among its clients, and went on to star in campaigns for Burberry, shot by legendary photographer Mario Testino, Topshop and Stella McCartney, who kept Charlotte’s real voice in her ads.

The Tesco commercial was first aired last month and shows Charlotte, 23, cavorting through supermarket aisles, with groceries depicted in bright single colours, as she wears F&F fashions.

And while her voice was replaced with a ‘received pronunciation’ accent for the ads in England and Scotland, in Ireland she has been given an Irish accent.

Tesco was unavailable for comment last night, and Select Model Agency declined to comment.