A national advertising self-regulatory group determined Monday that television ads for Golden Valley-based General Mills' "Yoplait Splitz" are not likely to confuse children into thinking the yogurt product is actually ice cream.
The Children's Advertising Review Unit of the Council of Better Business Bureaus was acting on a complaint from a consumer who teaches an after-school advertising literacy program.
The commercial involves a boy who peels back the lid of Splitz, a new dessert yogurt aimed at kids, and hears ice-cream truck music. A bunch of other kids hear the music, too, and start yelling "ice cream, ice cream, ice cream." The boy with the Splitz then says "No, it's yogurt."
The Children's Advertising Review Unit noted that such techniques could potentially create a "misimpression" but didn't in this particular case. The Splitz commercial didn't show an actual ice cream truck or children eating ice cream, and the "animated visual" of an ice cream sundae at the end of the ad conveyed a connection to the yogurt's flavor, the review board said.
Mike Hughlett • 612-673-7003
