It’s been confirmed that the bloody annoying ‘ARE YOU BEACH BODY READY?’ Protein World adverts for weight-loss supplements have been taken down from London Underground stations after weeks of campaigns, petitions and people writing hilarious things on the posters – because they’ve come to the end of their advertising cycle. Sorry, protestors.
The Tfl press office told The Debrief: ‘This advertisement will begin to be removed from our network as scheduled from tomorrow. We have received one complaint about it and we will be guided by The Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) and Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) if a similar advert were to be submitted again.’
A spokesperson added: ‘Protein World paid for three weeks of advertising on our network. This period comes to an end tomorrow, so naturally the advertisements will be replaced.’
Sadly, the backlash wasn’t behind the removal of the posters (as was first thought), which is incrediby annoying because we really wanted them to get unceremoniously removed. Richard Stavely, the head of Global Marketing at Protein World, defended the adverts on Good Morning Britain this morning, when host Susannah Reid said: ‘Am I irrational by finding that advert a little bit anxiety inducing?’
The Protein World boss responded: ‘That may be but we are a fitness brand, our own aspirations are to make the nation healthier and ask each one of us to set our sights higher, to be fitter, to be healthier and actually have an inner and outer confidence within ourselves.’
He added that there have been threats to the head office, and even ‘a bomb threat that’s been reported to the police’, but they won’t be changing their advertising methods in the future.
Even though the posters may have ended their cycle with London Underground, and TfL only received one complaint, the ASA said it has received 216 complaints about the advert and is ‘carefully assessing’ the complaints to ‘establish if there are grounds for further action.’
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.