Fat Burning Lip Balm?
September 12, 2009 by Jo
LA based lip balm manufacturer Pacific North Shore Holdings launched a ‘fat burning’ lip balm claiming that the lip balm had been scientifically tested to stop the wearer from snacking between meals.
Although the lip balm had already been sold in the North American market, it only recently launched the lip balm onto the UK market where it was met with a storm of criticism from UK consumer groups.
Although the US have the FDA as a regulatory authority on advertising claims that insist on ‘substantiated evidence’, the product and the associated campaign with the fat burning claims has gone unchecked in the USA.
In the United Kingdom the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is an essentially self regulating body that responds to claims from consumers and consumer groups. Their involvement typically comes when manufacturers make claims that go beyond the accepted cosmetic and into physiological as has happened with the fat burning lip balm.
Consumers, although often seduced by cosmetic company claims are also becoming aware that cosmetic manufacturers prey on this susceptibility in their marketing. A number of consumer complaints to the ASA have been upheld recently including anti aging creams claiming to reverse the signs of aging and creams that claim to have the same effect as Botox.
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