WASHINGTON — In a series of popular DirecTV commercials starring Rob Lowe, the actor plays versions of himself where he’s scrawny, a meathead and downright creepy — but now the ads may be pulled because they are being called misleading.
On Tuesday, Better Business Bureau National Advertising Division pushed DirecTV to pull the ads after cable giant Comcast filed a complaint, CBS News reports.
In the ads, a handsome DirecTV-customer Lowe is featured side-by-side with some of his cable-watching alter egos. The ads also say DirecTV has “better signal reliability than cable” as well “shorter customer service wait times.”
The National Advertising Division said those claims are “unsupported” and they should stop airing the ads, CBS News reports.
DirecTV responded saying that the advertisements are so outlandish and exaggerated that no reasonable consumer would believe the statements made in them require substantiation.
The ads have led to DirecTV success, Los Angeles Times media writer Stephen Battaglio told CBS News.
“They were losing subscribers before this campaign came on. They gained subscribers in the two quarters where they ran the ads,” Battaglio said.
DirecTV doesn’t have to stop running the commercials as the National Advertising Division’s findings are not legally binding.
Watch some of the ads below:
