Industry news: Cool reception for beer ad

Foster's spot charged with promoting domestic violence

The UK Advertising Standards Authority received many complaints about a new ad for Foster's beer that shows a man pushing a women's face over a glass of beer. The concerns are that it promotes domestic violence.

The commercial is one in a series promoting Foster's Super Chilled beer. In others Aussie men follow clouds, stand under hovering seagulls and deny the advances of statuesque women to keep their beers in the shade.

In the controversial spot, a couple is lying on a sun-kissed Australian beach. A blonde, bikini-clad woman leans over to kiss her boyfriend, but he shoves her face to the side to shade his beer, saying, "You're a good sport, Cheryl."

"Don't move," he says as he holds the woman's face over the beer.

The ad ends with the slogan: "Well you wouldn't want a warm beer, would you?"

The ASA said the majority of the complaints it has received about the commercial are that it depicts domestic violence.

A spokesman for Foster's in Australia said local brewer Scottish & Newcastle wholly owned the brand in the UK. Decisions about the management of advertising campaigns in the UK were made by Scottish & Newcastle, he said.

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