27 July 2018: Promotion of Covonia by Thornton & Ross
Published 7 September 2018
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Johnson & Johnson complained about posts on the Covonia UK Facebook and twitter accounts operated by Thornton & Ross. The complainant alleged that the advertisements referred to a recommendation by a person whose celebrity could encourage use of the product.
The first element of the complaint concerned a video featuring the person that had been amended by Thornton & Ross to refer to Covonia. MHRA did not consider it likely that someone viewing the video would consider it a recommendation from that person to use the product.
The second element concerned a tweet by Covonia UK that included an embedded tweet from the person that included a picture showing a bottle of Covonia Chesty Cough.
The MHRA upheld this part of the complaint against Thornton & Ross. The tweet from the person’s twitter account did not itself recommend the products shown but MHRA considered that the action of Thornton and Ross in commenting on the person’s use of Covonia products in an advertisement constituted an implied recommendation in breach of regulation 289 of the Regulations.
MHRA also considered that the promotional tweet did not include a clear invitation to read the label or package leaflet, as required by regulation 291(2).
Thornton & Ross agreed to delete the tweet.