Rimmel London has been forced to pull an apparently “misleading” mascara ad featuring Cara Delevingne and her dangerously beautiful lashes.
The Advertising Standards Authority ruled to ban the ad, citing the use of false lashes to sell Rimmel’s line of mascara, Scandaleyes Reloaded, which promises consumers “dangerously bold lashes.” BBC reports that the ad “didn’t say Delevingne had also been given individual lash inserts to fill in gaps and that some lashes had been re-drawn in post-production.”
Rimmel’s parent company Coty UK defended the ad, insisting that Delevingne’s lashes were appropriately full on they’re own and that the methods used to enhance them—lash inserts and post-production fill-ins—are standard practice.
But the ASA took a different view. It concluded that the effect of the lash inserts or the post-production – or both – was to give the appearance of “longer lashes with more volume.”
The ASA ruling said: “Because the ad conveyed a volumising, lengthening and thickening effect of the product we considered the use of lash inserts and the post-production technique were likely to exaggerate the effect beyond what could be achieved by the product among consumers.
This form of false advertising has been an ongoing issue in the advertising world and something the UK has taken great measures to regulate. Beauty companies, nevertheless, always find ways to go about their trickery.
