Matt Le Tissier, John Hartson and Anthony Fowler have been rapped by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) over social media posts promoting CBD products.
The advertising watchdog upheld complaints relating to posts about Supreme CBD by the trio of former sports stars for failing to disclose they were advertisements and “making health claims about a food product”.
City A.M. revealed last year that posts former footballers including Hartson and Le Tissier and ex-boxer Fowler, who owns Supreme CBD, were under investigation by the ASA.
Supreme CBD ads
The ASA’s judgement, published today, states that the trio’s tweets were not clearly identifiable as marketing communications and that there were commercial deals in place with both Hartson and Le Tissier. They and Fowler have been told to label any future posts accordingly and refrain from making claims about products’ health benefits.
The judgement states: “We told Supreme CBD, Anthony Fowler, John Hartson and Matt Le Tissier to ensure their future ads were obviously identifiable as marketing communications, and that identifiers such as ‘#ad’ were used and were clearly and prominently displayed.
“We also told them to ensure their future ads did not state or imply that the products could prevent, treat or cure human disease.”
Hartson admitted in his response to questions by the ASA that in some instances his tweets made claims that he could not substantiate. One post stated: “Hello Dave tell your Mrs I’ll buy her a box to help with her anxiety, @supreme_cbd is changing people’s lives for the better, I’ll DM you details [thumbs up emoji]”.
Le Tissier’s May post stated: “I’ve been very sceptical of a lot of things including @supreme_cbd when it was first recommended to me, but it’s honestly a game changer for people with anxiety/depression, any aches/pain or insomnia.”
All three claims – relating to a lack of declaration over adverts and their claims to cure anxiety and insomnia – were upheld by the ASA.