Alcohol companies promote their products to boost sales, by both expanding their customer base and encouraging existing customers to buy more. Research has shown how alcohol advertising targets younger drinkers to encourage them to become heavier drinkers in the future, thereby providing significant profits for alcohol companies in the future.1
Alcohol marketing
Many of us across the country are impacted every day by the harm caused by alcohol - which is why it is vital that we have evidence-based policies in place to make sure that alcohol is marketed responsibly.
Why it matters
If alcohol marketing convinces us to drink more, then the range of harms linked to alcohol will likely increase as a result – from headaches and sleepless nights to weight gain, high blood pressure, anxiety and cancer.
Sometimes it feels that alcohol marketing is everywhere we go and always associated with the things we love - sponsorships at sports and music events, drinks promoted in our favourite movies, adverts in our social media feeds, celebrity endorsements, and promotional displays in shops celebrating all manner of things like Valentine’s Day, Halloween, birthdays and weddings.
To illustrate, one wine brand in 2023 partnered with publisher Penguin offering customers early access to summer novels, and a leading beer brand even created an entire TV series, which showcased comedian Jack Whitehall, DJ Maya Jama, and ex-rugby star Lawrence Dallaglio’s travels across Italy.2
These types and sheer volume of promotions can make it harder to cut down our drinking or to take a break, even when we’d really like to. It also impacts our children’s attitudes towards alcohol and how much they drink in the future.3 Children and young people regularly see alcohol adverts4 on television and online, meaning they are more likely to begin drinking at a younger age and consume more. 5, 6
Despite there being rules in place about the type of things that alcohol adverts can’t say – such as not linking alcohol with irresponsible or anti-social behaviour,7 or portraying alcohol as indispensable or as a priority in life8 - drinking is still often presented as exciting, glamorous, adventurous and funny,9 and the adverse consequences of, or alternatives to, alcohol consumption are rarely shown. The UK public agrees that tougher rules are needed to limit our exposure to alcohol marketing.10 Perhaps it’s no wonder given that, as long ago as 2009, a House of Commons Health Select Committee investigation, which gained access to internal marketing documents from alcohol producers and their advertising agencies, showed how alcohol adverts target young people, appeal to our masculinity and femininity, and seek to link alcohol with social success.11
How regulation works
Given that an alcohol-free childhood is the healthiest option for children and young people,12 it follows that alcohol should be properly regulated, making sure that it is marketed responsibly and only to adult drinkers.
Who does the regulating is important too. In the UK we have a co- and self-regulatory system, which means that alcohol companies have a degree of control over how the industry is regulated. Other countries do things differently, whereby the government is the sole regulator.
One prominent example is France, where the government’s ‘Evin law’, introduced in 1991, comprehensively restricts the content and placement of alcohol marketing, including a ban on television and cinema adverts and limiting content to factual information only – although aggressive lobbying from the alcohol industry has meant these restrictions have been watered down in recent years.13
And even with this law, there are ways for the alcohol industry to get around such rules through something known as ‘alibi marketing’. This is where indirect references to brands through the use of colours, fonts and slogans are used – most noticeably seen in sports sponsorship. For example, a study of the 2020 Six Nations men’s rugby championship found that matches played in France showcased a large static advert that said ‘Greatness’, a word chosen and designed to resemble the ‘Guinness’ logo and positioned in the middle of the television picture.14
In the UK, non-broadcast advertising, marketing and labelling are self-regulated by the industry via the Advertising Standards Authority; broadcast advertising is co-regulated by the Advertising Standards Authority and Ofcom; and the Portman Group, which is funded by twelve alcohol companies,15 oversees alcohol packaging and labelling.
The end result is that no single regulator sees the complete picture and that, to a large extent, the industry is regulating themselves. The activities of current regulators have also been shown to lack transparency. An examination of the Portman Group’s rulings on alcohol advertising complaints from 2006-17 found that decision-making has not been consistent and that decisions often appeared subjective.16
What needs to change
Alcohol marketing is everywhere – on our streets, in our shops, on our televisions, in our social media content, and at our favourite sports and music events - all designed to increase alcohol sales and which, in turn, means we end up drinking more.
To improve our health, including the health of our children, and enable us to make up our own mind about when and how much we drink, as well to feel more empowered to cut back or cut out our alcohol consumption, we need to put in place some sensible restrictions on the ways that alcohol can be promoted.
We are calling for a thorough overhaul of the way alcohol marketing is regulated – so that alcohol producers and sellers are clear about how they can and can’t promote their products, and consumers know when they can expect the regulators to step in.
Specifically, we need:
- A formal review of digital and offline alcohol marketing, including advertising and promotion.
- Tighter, evidence-based regulation of all aspects of alcohol marketing.
- Regulation of alcohol marketing to be wholly independent from the alcohol, retail and hospitality industries.
- Public health and the reduction of alcohol harm to be prioritised in marketing regulation.
Page updated: June 2024
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References
1 Maani Hessari, N., Bertscher, A., Critchlow, N., Fitzgerald, N., Knai, C., Stead, M., & Petticrew, M. (2019). Recruiting the “heavy-using loyalists of tomorrow”: an analysis of the aims, effects and mechanisms of alcohol advertising, based on advertising industry evaluations. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 16(21), 4092.
2 Nott,G. (15 December 2023). How advertisers got serious about humour: Top Campaigns 2023.
3 Sargent, J. D., & Babor, T. F. (2020). The relationship between exposure to alcohol marketing and underage drinking is causal. Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, Supplement, (s19), 113-124.
4 Critchlow, N., MacKintosh, A. M., Thomas, C., Hooper, L., & Vohra, J. (2019). Awareness of alcohol marketing, ownership of alcohol branded merchandise, and the association with alcohol consumption, higher-risk drinking, and drinking susceptibility in adolescents and young adults: A cross-sectional survey in the UK. BMJ open, 9(3), e025297.
5 Critchlow, N., MacKintosh, A. M., Thomas, C., Hooper, L., & Vohra, J. (2019). Awareness of alcohol marketing, ownership of alcohol branded merchandise, and the association with alcohol consumption, higher-risk drinking, and drinking susceptibility in adolescents and young adults: A cross-sectional survey in the UK. BMJ open, 9(3), e025297.
6 Giesbrecht, N., Reisdorfer, E., & Shield, K. (2024). The impacts of alcohol marketing and advertising, and the alcohol industry's views on marketing regulations: Systematic reviews of systematic reviews. Drug and Alcohol Review.
7 BCAP Code, s19.5 – see https://www.asa.org.uk/type/broadcast/code_section/19.html
8 BCAP Code, s19.7 – see https://www.asa.org.uk/type/broadcast/code_section/19.html
9 Pettigrew, S., Jongenelis, M. I., Jongenelis, G., Pierce, H., Stafford, J., & Keric, D. (2020). Get them laughing to get them drinking: An analysis of alcohol advertising themes across multiple media in Australia. Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 81(3), 311-319.
10 YouGov survey was conducted on behalf of Action on Smoking and Health. (2021). See https://ahauk.org/news/brits-back-new-controls-to-protect-children-from-alcohol-advertising/#_ftn1
11 Hastings, G., Brooks, O., Stead, M., Angus, K., Anker, T., & Farrell, T. (2010). " They'll drink bucket loads of the stuff": An analysis of internal alcohol industry documents.
12 Donaldson, L. (2009) Guidance on the consumption of alcohol by children and young people, DHSC.
13 Millot, A., Maani, N., Knai, C., Petticrew, M., Guillou-Landréat, M., & Gallopel-Morvan, K. (2022). An analysis of how lobbying by the alcohol industry has eroded the French évin law since 1991. Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 83(1), 37-44.
14 Purves, R. I., & Critchlow, N. (2021). Alcohol marketing during the 2020 Six Nations Championship: a frequency analysis.
16 Alcohol Change UK (2018) Fit for Purpose? An analysis of the role of the Portman Group in alcohol industry self-regulation