A complaint against KFC’s latest commercial for its All Star Box by competitor Chicken Licken has resulted in the fried chicken giant being rapped over the knuckles for unfairly imitating its competitor’s advert.
The directorate of the Advertising Regulatory Board (ARB) was called upon by Chicken Licken’s lawyers to consider its complaint against KFC’s TV advert released on May 13 — which has since been withdrawn.
According to the complaint, the KFC advert focused on ‘Protagonist A’ — a man enjoying a KFC All Star Box as a male narrator states “Oh, look at me, I’m a cool guy in an All Star Box ad”.
A woman is then heard saying “Oh he’s so cool”, with the man responding “Yeah, so cool. Now I am eating it sloooow. So finger licking good.”
Protagonist A is then joined by two cloned characters, and all three are shown enjoying the All Star Box as the voice over states “All this food for me? I am going to need even more mes to finish all this delicious bang for my buck.”
The camera focuses on the clones who are shown staring in awe and admiration at Protagonist A.
The next scene shows KFC employee Nandi behind the counter taking orders. She approaches the clones and asks “Done being salty?”
The first clones replies “I will have what he’s having” and the second says “Me too”. The closing scene shows the various All Star Box offerings.
Chicken Licken formally complained about the advert, claiming that over decades, it had invested millions in advertising its business through a range of highly creative advertisements. As a result, it had become a market leader and achieved iconic status along with substantial goodwill.
To illustrate this, Chicken Licken referred to two such adverts, one making use of the character “I am Sbu”, the other athlete “Dave ‘Legs of Thunder’ Mgijimi”.
The “I am Sbu” commercial shows a quirky and cerebral science teacher who invents a robotic version of himself, which he uses to fill in for him whenever his cravings for Chicken Licken’s Hotwings get the better of him — an illustration of the extreme lengths a customer will go to satisfy that craving.
“I am Sbu” was flighted extensively on TV, and was a hit with consumers. Despite having been made in 2018, it is still accessible on Chicken Licken’s YouTube page and on Hello Africa, where it is still watched and has run up more than 250,000 views.
Chicken Licken said the advert was widely acclaimed, had won numerous awards and was still recognised by customers and remained relevant to the business.
The second advert featured “Dave ‘Legs of Thunder’ Mgijimi” — a promotion Chicken Licken described as a humorous attempt at giving South Africans the best solution to make their families proud through its “Family Full House Meal” promotion, regarded as one of its most popular sharing meals.
The central star in the April 2024 advert is athlete David Mgijimi, a character hard to beat on the racetrack and the pride of the family.
Like “I am Sbu”, the advert was an immediate hit, won numerous awards and garnered more than 1.4-million views on the Chicken Licken YouTube page alone.
KFC responded by claiming that the characters depicted in its campaign were not intended to reference either the “I Am Sbu” or “Dave ‘Legs of Thunder’ Mgijimi” characters, nor did it attempt to associate its own brand with Chicken Licken’s products.
While KFC did not deny making reference to the two adverts, it claimed that its own lookalike was intended merely to be a parody.
Chicken Licken argued that without viewers’ recognition of the “original” material — being Chicken Licken’s popular ads — KFCs advert fell flat. This meant that, contrary to its denials, KFC had intentionally referenced the Chicken Licken campaign characters “Sbu” and “Dave Mgijimi” and without this understanding the KFC advert failed to be amusing.
Chicken Licken complained that KFC had merely copied its advertising in a clearly recognisable manner, rather than creating its own unique advertising concept. The success of its advert hinged exclusively on the use of look-a-like characters .
“As such, the argument and reliance on parody as a defence is misplaced,” the ARB directorate found, as it agreed with Chicken Licken.
“It is apparent that the advertiser has set out, primarily, to make use of and exploit the goodwill and recognition the two characters enjoy among consumers ... to its advantage and, also, to disparage the complainant’s products,” Chicken Licken argued.
This was in reference to the KFC character ‘Nandi’ posing the question “Done being salty?” to Chicken Licken ambassadors Sbu and Dave — which it said could be seen as a literal claim by KFC that its product is superior to Chicken Licken.
It argued that the colloquial meaning of “salty” in slang meant to be annoyed, resentful or bitter.
KFC denied that the advert amounted to disparagement, claiming there was no reference to Chicken Licken’s products in its advert, nor would the relevant viewership believe this was the intention of the advertisement. It described the advert as a parody intended to amuse, which should not be seen as an exploitation of Chicken Licken’s goodwill.
The directorate found that there could be no doubt that the characters used in the KFC advert were Chicken Licken’s Sbu and Dave Mgijima, and that it was impossible for KFC to have independently created the lookalikes for an advert to be flighted in the same competitive sphere.
The directorate found that by making use of Chicken Licken’s strong brand representatives, KFC had effectively diluted this.
“The strong brand link in these characters is now, most likely, not as strong, and their advertising value to [Chicken Licken] is very probably diminished.”
KFC was instructed to withdraw the advertisement immediately.
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