Morrisons continues Aldi ad spat as it reveals plans to complain about rival's Euro 2016 campaign
Morrisons is poised to continue an ongoing ad spat with rival supermarket Aldi, revealing plans to complain to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) about one of the bargain retailer’s price comparison ads.
Morrisons has taken issue with Aldi's 'Prince Crunch' campaigns in the past / Aldi
The news comes after a ruling issued by the regulator yesterday (29 June), which saw three of Aldi’s campaigns banned for being "misleading" following complaints from two members of the public and Morrisons.
Morrisons said that despite the slap on the wrists from the watchdog, Aldi has launched a similar price comparison marketing push which is “just as unfair” and shows the retailer hasn’t “changed its ways".
The fresh complaint relates to an Aldi TV campaign centred on the Euro 2016 tournament, which the German store says is fully compliant with ASA rules.
The poster and TV campaigns which were banned yesterday (an example of which can be seen above) were created by Aldi’s longstanding agency McCann and claimed that a basket of goods from Aldi would cost more if bought from any of the ‘big four’ retailers. The ASA banned the ads, validating complaints that the drive did not make it clear that Aldi’s own-brand products were being compared with branded products.
The discount chain’s UK and Ireland chief executive Matthew Barnes told that BBC that the brand was "extremely disappointed" with the "ambiguous and inconsistent" decision.
"The use of comparative advertising is a well-established principle and is firmly in the interests of consumers and encourages competition between retailers," he said.