Vype banned from promoting e-cigs on Instagram after using Lily Allen to advertise it
VAPING firm Vype, which used celebrities including Lily Allen to advertise its e-cigs, has been banned from promoting its products on Instagram.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) received complaints about seven Vype posts from earlier this year, three of which featured captioned pictures of singer Lily Allen.
Other posts promoting Vype included a picture of Love Island star Olivia Attwood smoking an e-cigarette.
The ruling has been handed down by the ASA following complaints from anti-smoking campaign groups that the posts broke advertising rules.
Under UK law, companies aren't allowed to advertise unlicensed e-cigarettes that contain nicotine online, in magazines, or in newspapers.
Three other e-cigarette firms - Ama Vape Lab, Attitude Vapes and Mylo Vapes - have also been told to stop promoting their wares on the social network site.
A post by Mylo Vape in October included a picture of a woman with an e-cigarette and the caption "#repost @rae_eleanor loving her #mylo".
While Attitude Vapes posted a black and white image of someone smoking an e-cigarette with the caption "Attitude is everything #LiquidsWithAttitude".
Ama Vape's post in March included an image of someone smoking its Shock Spearmint product with the caption "SHOCK Spearmint! With @amiiegiffen."
British American Tobacco (BAT), which owns Vype, and the other three companies all argued their Instagram posts simply provided permitted factual information such as the name, content and price of their products.
But the ASA disagreed, ruling that the posts "clearly went beyond the provision of factual information" and were promotional in nature.
It's banned the ads and said they can't be used again unless the firms ensure they can only be seen by their followers and not by other users.
The ASA said: "We considered that material from a public Instagram account was not analogous to a retailer's own website and that material posted from such an account was therefore subject to the prohibition on advertising of unlicensed, nicotine-containing e-cigarettes, meaning that neither promotional nor factual content was permitted."
It also warned the companies against showing people who are, or seem to be, under 25, using e-cigarettes or playing a significant role in vaping ads.
Professor Anna Gilmore, director of the Tobacco Control Research Group at the University of Bath, the research partner of Stop, said: "This is a major step forward in stopping the tobacco industry from promoting its new addictive products to children and teenagers.
"But given that cigarette sales are falling and tobacco companies are desperate to recruit young people into using these new products, ongoing vigilance is essential."
Simon Cleverly, group head of corporate affairs at British American Tobacco, added: "While we believed that the content included in the complaint was compliant with the ASA's CAP Code, we will abide by the ASA's decision and recommendation to remove the relevant posts and amend our Instagram account settings."
A spokesperson for Mylo said: "Mylo's mission has always been to help adult smokers make the switch to vaping as the less harmful alternative.
"We take the concern about teen seriously and have taken even further steps internally to ensure we prevent any incidences like this happening again."
Lily Allen declined to comment.
The Sun has contacted Olivia Attwood's representative, as well as Ama Vape Lab, Attitude Vapes and Mylo Vapes.
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