Comparative Advertising…I'm OK…You're Not OK.

Jack Roberts from Ogilvy & Mather attacks the problem of comparative advertising in his speech at the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4A's) Eastern Annual Conference in 1973.

Comparative Advertising…I'm OK…You're Not OK.

Jack Roberts

Unlike some other "hot buttons" on our communications keyboard, the Comparative Advertising issue has been a key portion of the Standards of Practice (of the A.A.A.A. Creative Code) since 1924. It was endorsed by the ANA, the NAB, the AIA, the MFA, the NBP and the rest of the alphabet in 1962. It reads: "we will not knowingly produce advertising which contains – (d) Comparisons which unfairly disparage a competitive product or service."

Evidently, some advertisers were unknowingly doing just that... and, four years later, the A.A.A.A. found it necessary to issue a...

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