The "Lies" Advertisers Can Legally Tell You - Cheddar Explains

in the late 90s there was a shadow war going on or that was fought right under our noses and right in our mouths a pizza war in the 1990s delivery pizza was a hot market piping hot and chains made all sorts of ridiculous claims about their pizza pizza could cure depression reunite families and somehow was the reason we defeated the Soviet Union this war was waged through advertising Domino's claimed the fastest delivery times Little Caesars was the cheapest and Pizza Hut the largest chain dominated the dining experience but a new competitor Papa John's had set its sights on overtaking Pizza Hut as the top chain by any means necessary including featuring Pizza Hut's founder in its commercials as a Papa John's franchise owner I found a better people the Pizza War had gone nuclear but it was Papa John's slogan that was the boldest strategy of all it just straight-up claimed its pizza was better this was too much for Pizza Hut and in 1997 it sued Papa John's for false advertising it wouldn't be the last time Papa John Schneider got in trouble for saying something he shouldn't have but the weird thing is Papa John's agreed with Pizza Hut the company admitted in court that the slogan wasn't true and shouldn't be believed because of this Papa John's won and got to keep the slogan Papa John's used this weird loophole that sneakily exploited everywhere and advertising a loophole where words can simultaneously mean everything in nothing at all a loophole that kind of lets advertisers lie about their products and get away with it a slogan can define a company it's a way to hardwire a brand into a consumers brain good slogans can create a feeling or a mood like warm and fuzzy but brands are competing for hearts and minds so they need to set themselves apart from the competition but what are claims like these based on usually nothing when advertisers make vague claims about their products they're engaging in puffery puffery is a legal distinction for speech that is so exaggerated a reasonable person would never believe it to be true it's a defense against accusations of false advertising usually any claim in an ad has to be backed up by some form of evidence otherwise it's deceptive but puffery is making claims without any evidence because what they're describing according to the advertiser is impossible to define or measure competing companies and their lawyers debate what these taglines and slogans mean all the time but who gets to decide if an ad is lying my name is Hal hotus I'm a senior staff attorney at the advertising self-regulatory Council the a.src is the first check on questionable advertisements the first test for puffery is to ask if a normal person would believe what an ad is claiming the movie elf where he walks into this like dingy little coffee shop and they had a neon in the window that says world's best coffee and he bursts and he says nobody else in the scene thinks that this luncheonette has the world's best coffee the law understands that consumers aren't like elf consumers are like everybody else in the cafe spotting puffery may seem easy enough but what a word means can change from ad to ad so the adjective means different things in different contexts when it's attached to different nouns when it's presented in different visual context can be the line that separates puffery from false advertising in Papa John's was pushing it advertisements can serve two main purposes the first is brand identity better ingredients better pizza by itself didn't mean anything but slapping the slogan on everything was a good way to get people to remember Papa John's and it seemed to work but the second purpose is to promote all the great stuff about your product like your tomato sauce in 1997 Papa John's began associating better ingredients with the quality of their sauce and that of their competitors Papa John's was saying better ingredients meant better tasting sauce so Pizza Hut said prove it or ditch the tagline during the jury trial Pizza Hut called expert sauce and dough witnesses to prove that customers couldn't taste the difference seeing its brand identity under siege Papa John's through the puffery Hail Mary admitting the slogan didn't mean anything they said that it was an expression of pride its boasting its bluster but the court also ruled Papa John's had to stop with the comparative ads if you're making a statement about what consumers think you need evidence if you're just stating your own boastful opinion you don't need evidence because that's not something you can really prove but why do advertisers use puffery if everyone admits it's a bunch of BS we need to have space for companies to talk about their products in vague and unspecific ways it allows the creativity on sort of that brand identity as opposed to having ads that only say my product is X measured by Y so what's the next fight on the puffery front lines the word superior I feel like whether or not you're sort of saying good or better with the word superior is so such a fine line I think about these words way too much a pizza war Pizza war Pizza war a pizza war puffery let's me say that this was the best video ever made but can you think of any questionable advertisements that might have crossed the puffery line comment below and like and subscribe for more cheddar deep dives and breakdowns and turn on notifications so you can know when we make some more of this piping hot content

Channel: Cheddar

Views: 875,860

Rating: 4.8030181 out of 5

Keywords: Cheddar, cheddar explains, explainer video, explainer, delivery pizza, pizza, food, advertising, little caesars, dominos, pizza hut, papa johns, papa john, marketing, business, business case study, case study, business slogans, slogan, puffery, asrc, Advertising Self-Regulatory Council, puffery advertising examples, puffery commercials, puffery advertising, false advertising, advertising tricks, tricks, fast food

Id: hDX7xYKDOlo

Length: 6min 36sec (396 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 03 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/michaelbrules]

Ive timestamped where I think Zach. (22 seconds)