Asda
Asda's Christmas ad.
See the ad below. It was also accused of discriminating against fathers, who are portrayed as useless guests in their own homes during the holidays.
The TV ad showed a harassed mother swamped with festive preparations: shopping, cooking, cleaning, writing cards, wrapping presents and making beds.
The campaign, which ended with the line "Behind every great Christmas there's mum, and behind every mum there's Asda", prompted 620 complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority.
Asda stuck to its guns, saying that while a large number people might have felt that the ad was sexist, it was simply a fact that women do the lion's share of work at Christmas.
"Extensive consumer research and feedback indicated that the majority of their customers identified with the ad's representation of Christmas," the supermarket said. "Eight out of ten mothers [of 1,896 surveyed] ... believed the ad reflected common experience, rather than outdated stereotypes."
The ASA said that the TV ad was "not likely to be seen as condoning or encouraging harmful discriminatory behavior, or reinforcing negative stereotypes of men or women in general, and, for those reasons, considered it was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offense."
It dismissed the 620 complaints about the ad, which was created by agency Saatchi & Saatchi and also ran on ITV's video-on-demand service, Asda's website and YouTube channel.
• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".
• To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook
This article originally appeared on guardian.co.uk
