The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled against an ad that appeared on X for Kwiff for appealing to under-18s.

A post on Kwiff’s X account, seen on 14 July 2024, featured text stating “A potentially huge weekend for Sir Lewis Hamilton ahead of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone [race car emoji] #F1”. The post contained an image of Sir Lewis Hamilton and a banner across the bottom that featured an 18+ symbol and the BeGambleAware.org logo.

The post also contained a link to an article on Kwiff’s website about the British Grand Prix. 

The complainant, a researcher from the University of Bristol, challenged whether the ad included an individual who was likely to be of strong appeal to under-18s and therefore breached the code.

Eaton Gate Gaming Ltd t/a Kwiff said they believed the image used was reasonable in the context of the published advice of CAP which stated “that motorsports and golf are more adult-oriented and unlikely to be of inherent ‘strong’ appeal” and the demographic data they held for Sir Lewis Hamilton and their own social media following.

Kwiff said the post in question was created to drive traffic to their company blog; that website was separate from their gambling platform and the landing page from the article did not direct users to a gambling platform.

Kwiff considered the post was editorial commentary on a sporting event, which had no inducement to gamble and no call-to-action. It linked directly to a sports news blog and not to a web page where consumers could gamble.  They considered that the 18+ and BeGambleAware logos were not being used in the post as a signal of advertising, but as a precautionary compliance measure in line with their licencing requirements.

The post was published the day before the 2024 British Grand Prix, in which Sir Lewis Hamilton was a participant, and featured an image of him on a racing track, holding up the British flag. The post also included the 18+ and BeGambleAware.org logos.

The text also referred to another F1 driver, Lando Norris. We understood that Kwiff offered bets on the race, including for Sir Lewis Hamilton to win the race. We considered the purpose of the post was to promote the Kwiff brand and their gambling services, by highlighting a prominent and imminent sports event and referring to the participants, on whose performance consumers could bet, using Kwiff’s services. The ad linked through to an article which provided odds on the race, including for Sir Lewis Hamilton to win, which linked in turn to the Kwiff gambling site where bets could be placed.

The ASA considered the post was therefore directly connected with the supply of betting services and was an ad falling within the scope of the CAP Code.

We understood that Mercedes, his team at the time of the ad, sold Sir Lewis Hamilton clothing merchandise in children’s sizes and Funko POP! Toys in his image. Mr Hamilton also appeared as himself as a storyteller for CBeebies Bedtime Story on 3 July 2024. We considered that these appearances, products and associations increased his appeal to under-18s.

We acknowledged that Sir Lewis Hamilton was primarily famous for his association with an adult oriented sport but considered he was very well known to a general UK audience, including to children and young people. We considered, based on his public profile, commercial partnerships, media appearances and UK under-18 social media following, that he had strong appeal to under-18s.

For those reasons, we concluded the ad was irresponsible and breached the Code.

The ad must not appear again in its current form. The ASA told Eaton Gate Gaming Ltd t/a Kwiff not to include a person or character who had strong appeal to those under 18 years of age.