BATTERED by the recession and beset by zealous Government reformers, wavering clients and hostile consumer groups, the advertising business is undergoing a painful and probably permanent transformation. The old frothy ebullience has been replaced by a somber sense of reality and not a little anxiety. Says Richard Christian, president of the Marsteller advertising agency: "The whole business is a vast confusion."
The biggest worry is a relentless blitz of Government agencies, led by the Federal Trade Commission, to purge extravagant claims or outright deception in advertising and put more straight information into ads. Under its aggressive chairman, Lawyer Miles Kirkpatrick, the FTC last week hurled its latest bombshell. In an unprecedented action, it proposed that the nation's four largest cereal makers be broken up into smaller companies, partly on grounds that their lavish ad campaigns enabled them to keep out competitors and inflate prices. Kellogg, General Mills, General Foods and Quaker Oats were also accused by the agency of falsely advertising their products as body builders and aids to weight control. The case, which represents a new twist in antitrust enforcement, will almost certainly wind up in a long court battle. It raises a worrisome specter for all corporations that lean heavily on advertising for sales. The FTC is now considering hitting gasoline companies with a similar proposal.
In another startling thrust last month, the FTC proposed that broadcasters be required to give critics of commercials equal time to make counterclaims similar to antismoking ads. Conceivably this could lead to ecologists taking to the air to punch holes in auto and gasoline ads, chemists knocking down mouthwash promotions—and a flock of advertisers fleeing the home screen. The FTC has also called for companies using promotions that it deems deceptive to run "corrective" ads admitting the error. One such commercial is being broadcast for Profile Bread, which was touted by the Ted Bates Agency as a diet loaf, though its only contribution to weight reduction was thinner-than-usual slices. In the corrective ad, Actress Julia Meade flatly admits: "But eating Profile will not cause you to lose weight."
Looming behind these moves is the possibility of even broader Government restrictions on ads as a result of the FTC's recent wide-ranging hearings on the effects of advertising. The findings are likely to lead to tighter restraints on promotional puffery—vague claims that a product is healthier or "better." There also may well be stiffer controls on ads aimed at children and on promotions that baselessly imply that use of a product will bring success, happiness or riches.