Boohoo ‘send nudes’ advert banned for ‘objectifying women’

Missguided advertisement also banned by watchdog

Two separate advertisements for Boohoo and Missguided have been banned by watchdogs, with the former being deemed “socially irresponsible” while the latter “objectified women”.

Boohoo’s advertisement came in the form of a marketing email sent to subscribers in July that featured the heading: “Send Nudes” alongside an eyes emoji.

The body of the email contained a photograph of a female model wearing a beige jacket with the words “Send nudes. Set the tone with new season hues” written across it.

Following a review by the Advertising Standards Authority, the online retailer’s email was found to be irresponsible in spite of the brand’s claims that “nude” was solely used to refer to the colour of the beige jacket in the photograph that matched the colour of the model’s skin.

The ASA explained its concerns were specifically due to the fact that children might’ve seen the email, to which the brand pointed out that individuals must be at least 18 years old in order to subscribe to its newsletter.

But the ASA said online age is often “misreported” and said it “had not been provided with details of any further steps Boohoo had taken to reduce the likelihood of under-18s being targeted with the ad”.

The ASA ruled that because the advertisement was aimed at a relatively young audience, who it said “were more likely to be harmfully affected by pressure to share sexual images of themselves”, it considered the reference to “send nudes” to be in breach of its code.

Missguided’s now-banned advertisement featured on ITV Hub during Love Island in June. It opened with a close-up of a woman’s mouth holding a strawberry between her lips before going on to show a young woman in swimwear on a boat while on-text screen read: “If you plan on wearing clothes this summer … we’ve got you covered … kind of”.

The advertisement went on to show a young woman on the beach with her legs apart in what the ASA described as “seductive poses”.

Missguided said that its advertisement was aimed at promoting a certain type of lifestyle and had intended to empower young women by showing them as confident. It added that images such as the strawberry between the lips were "merely motifs used to create the lifestyle brand."

The online fashion brand also said the advertisement was “not overly different to images one might see on a beach during summer months or that were used in any ad for a bikini”.

But the ASA concluded that while some of the scenes were in keeping with those typical for advertisements for swimwear, those which showed women running their hands up and down their thighs and sitting astride motorbikes in thong bikinis were “sexually suggestive”.

“We did not therefore agree that the women in those scenes were presented as empowered, confident young women,” the advertising watchdogs state.

“We considered that the cumulative effect of the scenes meant that overall, the products had been presented in an overly-sexualised way that invited viewers to view the women as sexual objects.”

The ASA also stated that some viewers might be “seriously offended by advertising that presented women as sexual objects”.

In January, Boohoo and Missguided were named as two of the least sustainable fashion brands in the UK in a report published by the Environmental Audit Committee.

The Independent has contacted Boohoo and Missguided for comment.