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The U.K.’s advertising watchdog is up to its old tricks.
A Lexus magazine ad campaign for the Lexus RX 400h has been banned by Ofcom, MediaGuardian reports (via Environmental Leader). The ad headline read: “High performance. Low emissions. Zero guilt.”
Complaints made to the Advertising Standards Authority said that the claims misleadingly implied that the car caused little or no harm to the environment.
The watchdog ruled that Lexus could not make such comparisons and claims of environmental friendliness in future car ads if they could not be proved.
“We weren’t trying to be misleading and any changes that are needed, we will certainly make,” the Scotsman reports a Lexus spokesman as saying. “It wasn’t that we were trying to make a claim that was unsustainable. The car has low emissions compared to, say, a Land Rover or another 4×4. That is the message we were trying to communicate.”
Lexus has been intensifying its hybrid advertising recently. Last month, it was the sole sponsor of an online-only bonus issue of Th Week. In March, Lexus showed off its hybrids as the first advertiser on CNN’s free ad-supported mobile site.
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Broadcast nets will experience…
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Meet the Press, the show hosted by Tim Russert for 17 years before his death last June, is beginning to slip in ratings.
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Wal-Mart and Costco reported same-store gains in September, with sales rising 2.4% and 9% respectively. Sales at Target stores open at least a year fell 3%, writes Retailer Daily.
Below, fiscal results from the discount retail giants:
Sales of food and…
