An ad that used a suggestively placed glass of wine alongside the phrase “taste the bush” has been branded “obscene”, “sexist” and “degrading”.
Advertising standards officials said the Premier Estates Wine video, posted on YouTube, was a “clear reference to oral sex”.
In the advert, an unnamed woman takes a sip of Australian red wine before announcing: “Luscious, earthy, bursting with fruit and spice. Australia practically jumps out of the glass.
“In fact, some say you can almost taste the bush.”
As she says the last sentence she places the glass on the table directly in front of her crotch, where the wine in the glass mimics the implied shape of her pubic hair.
In a ruling published on Wednesday, the Advertising Standards Authority said: “The ASA considered most viewers would understand the claim ‘some say you can almost taste the bush’ to be a reference to oral sex, particularly given that it was accompanied with the image of the wine glass positioned directly in front of the woman’s crotch.”
The ruling added: “We considered that it served to undermine her as, until that point, she had been portrayed as confident and in control while discussing the merits of the wine.
“For that reason, we considered that the ad presented the woman in a degrading manner, and concluded that it was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.”
The ruling also covered a still image posted on YouTube that displayed only the woman’s torso and thighs alongside the wine glass, and invited followers to tweet the words: “I want to #tastethebush.”
“We considered that consumers would understand the claim “#TasteTheBush”, particularly when accompanied with an image of a woman standing behind a wine glass, which emphasised her crotch, to be a double-entendre referring to both Australian red wine, and female genitalia and oral sex,” said the ASA.
The ads were also in breach of the Ad Standards Code by linking sex with alcohol, the report said.
Budge Brands Ltd, Premier Estates’ parent company, “acknowledged that the joke might not be to everyone’s taste” but said it had been “careful to ensure the wording worked on both levels – as innuendo and as a straight piece of monologue”.
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The firm denied it was linking alcohol with sexual activity, and said the advert was not degrading to women because the narrator was shown as “confident, elegant […] calm and reasoned”.
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