‘Natural’ sandwich adverts banned

TWO adverts for sandwich chain Pret A Manger have been banned for implying that its products are natural despite some containing artificial additives.

The charity Sustain complained that Pret’s website and Facebook claims its products were natural and without “obscure chemicals” implied its food was free from artificial additives.

Pret said its mission statement was to “create handmade, natural food, avoiding the obscure chemicals, additives and preservatives common to so much of the prepared and fast food on the market today”.

But it said Sustain had “mischaracterised” this as an “absolute, objective claim that Pret A Manger’s products contained only natural ingredients and were additive free”.

Pret told the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) the statement was “expressed as a ‘mission’ and was therefore an ideal state or their ultimate goal” and “very different from a claim that Pret A Manger had arrived at that ideal state”.

It also said it only claimed to “avoid” as opposed to entirely eliminate “obscure” rather than all chemicals and preservatives.

The ASA said consumers were likely to interpret the claims to mean that Pret’s foods were natural as they did not contain obscure chemicals, additives and preservatives.

It said: “Those claims were misleading and breached our code.”