Plant-based food brand Huel has been criticised again by the Advertising Standards Agency (for the second time in two months) for “misleading” claims about its products, including the suggestion that some of its Daily Greens powder was cheaper than fresh vegetables.
The company, which takes its name from the abbreviated words “human fuel”, had already been in trouble with the advertising watchdog in August after Dragon’s Den star Steven Bartlett failed to explain himself clearly in Facebook posts promoting Huel saying he had a financial interest in the company.
A video featuring the company’s co-founder Julian Hearn was found to be in breach of advertising code once again today.
In the video, posted to Instagram earlier this year, Hearn is heard saying: ‘You’ve been told to eat vegetables all your life, and a lot of people can’t get that amount of vegetables into their diet (…) we’ve taken a very broad range of vegetables, so you’re getting a product that’s equally good, or in my opinion better, but you’re getting it substantially cheaper.’
Two bans in two months: A complaint against “complete meals” brand Huel was upheld by the Advertising Standards Agency on September 25, with the watchdog saying a social media post featuring co-founder Julian Hearn was “misleading” about the health benefits of the brand’s Daily Greens product.
The two breaches reported by the ASA in recent weeks, including one on August 14 which said Huel had misled consumers by failing to be transparent about Dragon’s Den star Steven Bartlett being a director of the company
However, the ASA ruled that Hearn’s nutrition claims were not a “permissible comparative nutrient claim” and amounted to a breach of the code.
The watchdog also reprimanded Huel for claiming the brand’s Daily Greens powder, which costs “from £1.50” per serving, was “substantially cheaper” than the average person’s daily cost of fresh green vegetables.
The summary of the judgment of 25 September said: ‘An Instagram video made unpermitted comparative nutritional claims and compared foods that were not in the same category.
‘It also contained misleading pricing claims and general health claims that were not accompanied by any specific authorised health claims.’
MailOnline has contacted Huel for comment.
Last month, the Dragon’s Den star was spotted in an advert praising Huel, which was banned by the advertising watchdog.
On 14 August, two paid posts shared on Facebook in February and March in which Steven Bartlett praised Huel’s products were found to be in breach of the ASA code because they failed to disclose that the billionaire businessman was a director of the company.
Huel challenged the ban at the time, arguing that it was clear from the ads that a commercial relationship existed and that consumers did not need to know the “exact nature” of those relationships.
Advertisements posted on Facebook showed Bartlett, who has a financial interest in the company, calling the Daily Greens powder “Huel’s best product.”
Huel, known for its vitamin-enriched foods (in ads Bartlett claimed its Daily Greens powder was the “best product” he had ever launched), argued that consumers had no doubt about the existence of such commercial relationships when they saw the endorsement within a paid advertisement run by a company.
This expectation eliminated the need for the business relationship to be explicitly stated, Huel said.
However, the ASA found that many consumers were unlikely to understand from the ads that Bartlett had a financial interest in Huel’s performance.
He said: ‘We considered Bartlett’s direction to be important to consumers’ understanding of the advertisements and therefore relevant to them being able to make an informed decision about the advertised product.
“As the advertisements omitted important information about Steven Bartlett’s position as a director at Huel, we concluded that they were likely to be misleading.”