Banned, the Lineker ad for holidays you can’t win
A TV advert featuring Gary Lineker for a controversial Walkers crisps ‘win a holiday’ game has been banned.
The move comes after the snack giant failed to make clear consumers’ chances of winning luxury holidays to destinations including Tokyo, New York and Hong Kong were minuscule.
In fact, just 796 of the promised 20,000 luxury holidays were won, leaving thousands of people disappointed.
Some crisp lovers spent a small fortune buying hundreds of packets carrying special codes for the ‘Spell & Go’ competition. Players had to enter a code on a Walkers website to be given a ‘random’ letter that could then be used to spell out the name of a holiday destination.
But the computers used to generate the ‘random’ letters were effectively rigged so only a tiny number related to expensive holidays.
Scores of customers complained that it was impossible to get the letters C, D or K which they needed. As a result they could not win holidays to places such as Bangkok and Sri Lanka.
By mid-June, of 12.8million codes entered on the site just 98 yielded a K. There were only 252 Ds and 278 Cs. These were known as Type 1 letters and were linked to the most luxurious trips.
Eventually, 20,000 of the Type 1 letters were circulated, but this was still a tiny fraction of the total. TV ads for the promotion showed Lineker turning down beach volleyball with a group of beautiful women, surfing and other holiday activities, saying he couldn’t go as he ‘needed a P’. The ad cuts to reveal he has been daydreaming in a cafe and then he finds the letter ‘P’ to win a holiday in Cyprus.
A total of 112 people complained to the Advertising Standards Authority saying the competition was unfair. The ASA said the promotion had breached industry codes and the TV ad should not be repeated.
Walkers said: ‘We are aware that some customers are disappointed that they haven’t been successful in winning a holiday.’
The spokesman added that up to 20,000 holidays could have been won, saying: ‘We’d have honoured all of those should that have been the case.’