Rob Lowe DirecTV: Company Pulls Ads with 'Parks & Rec' Actor After Comcast Calls them Misleading
DirecTV has created several ads with Rob Lowe and his alter-egos that compare the satellite service to cable competitors. The ads are meant to be funny and promote DirecTV, but they are also being called misleading, CBS News reports.
Tuesday, a consumer watchdog group asked DirecTV to pull the ads after cable company Comcast filed a complaint.
The commercials claim that DirecTV has "better signal reliability than cable" and "shorter customer service wait times." The Better Business Bureau National Advertising Division said that those claims are "unsupported" and that the ads should be removed from the airwaves.
The ads always end with Lowe saying, "Don't be like this me -- Get rid of cable and upgrade to DirecTV."
"I think DirecTV thought, 'We have a great campaign, people are talking about it. It's entertaining people, and it's working. Let's run it until we get the cease and desist,'" Los Angeles Times media writer Stephen Battaglio said.
DirecTV says that the ads are exaggerated. They say that no reasonable consumer would believe the statements made in the ads.
"While humor can be an effective and creative way for advertisers to highlight the differences between their products and their competitor's, humor and hyperbole do not relieve an advertiser of the obligation to support messages that their advertisements might reasonably convey -- especially if the advertising disparages a competitor's product," the National Advertising Division said on Tuesday, according to Yahoo News.
The ads have been successful for DirecTV, which might mean that some consumers are believing the ads.
"They were losing subscribers before this campaign came on. They gained subscribers in the two quarters where they ran the ads," Battaglio said.
Although the ads have been successful for DirecTV, they have been accompanied by controversy almost the entire time.
Battaglio says that every Rob Lowe commercial that DirecTV made has come with a complaint from various groups.
The NAD's findings are not legally binding, which means that DirecTV will not be required to take the ads down if they do not want. DirecTV did tell CBS News that they planned on stopping the Rob Lowe ads at the end of April though. If the company wants to, they will be allowed to bring them back at any time.
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