I’ve already mentioned advertising at some length, but here’s one more recent observation.

I saw two commercials that surprised me last night. The first was a Burger King commercial, and the second was a Hardy’s commercial (another burger place, for non-US people). In Burger King’s, they were promoting a new burger and implied that it was better than a McDonald’s burger. I don’t recall the exact wording, but they were comparing the two burgers, and BK’s ad said a) their burger contained more meat, b) probably tasted better than the equivalent McDonald’s burger. They cleverly avoided saying it was definitely better, but the implication was clear and obvious. Hardy’s commercial was a similar situation, but the only specific name they used was “Big Mac,” which is obviously a McDonald’s burger to the majority of people.

Maybe this kind advertising is common to Americans, but it would never happen in British advertising.

For one, as previously mentioned, all British advertising is governed by Advertising Standards, and they set some pretty strict rules for what can and can not be in an advert. One of them is this:

Advertisements must not discredit or unfairly attack other products or services, advertisers or advertisements either directly or by implication

So that kind of thing is flat out not allowed in the UK. There’s another rule that goes like this:

Advertisements must reflect the spirit, not just the letter of the rules

So while you might be able to employ some clever wordplay that indirectly discredits a competitor without actually breaking the rules, the chance that Advertising Standards will let it fly is minimal.

As far as I can tell, the FTC’s Division of Advertising Practices handles this in the US, and doesn’t seem to make any such mention of denigration or discrediting of competitors. It does require that all claims be backed up with hard evidence — thus being able to say with certainty that a burger contains more meat than a competitor’s, but not that it tastes better.