Waitrose has issued an apology over its new Christmas advert. The supermarket's festive campaign featured farmers comparing their suntans - but the advertisement has attracted criticism from a leading charity and skin cancer patients.
The advert shows various clips of farm workers working all year round to create produce for Christmas food - and in one section, two farmers can be seen comparing their sun tan by rolling their sleeves up as they work in the heat. Gill Nuttall, chief executive at Melanoma UK, told the BBC people should "look at skin cancer with their eyes wide open," adding: "The comparing of tans dates back many years before we knew better."
Melanoma skin cancer is the fifth most common cancer in the UK with around 16,000 new cases of melanoma diagnosed each year, The Mirror reports. A Waitrose spokesperson said: "This advert shows the year-round effort behind our Christmas products and real farmers.
"We fully support sun safety and worked with a medic on set throughout the filming. They made sure everyone wore high factor sun protection, and gave advice to help our farmers stay safe, so we're sorry for the upset caused."
The video was also posted to Waitrose's Facebook page - liked by over 511,000 people - with one person who has melanoma commenting that it was "absolutely astonishing that a company like yourselves should be showing farmers glorifying in their sun tans", calling it "a kick in the teeth for all melanoma patients". Replying to the comment, Waitrose said it was "so sorry to hear this", adding the company supported sun safety and "sell sun care products across our stores".
But Ms Nuttall said: "Waitrose have a great platform to get a safety message out, yet when challenged on social media, their staff point out that they sell sun care products across their stores. I'm not sure they quite get the point. This advert isn't about sun cream, it's meant to be their Christmas offering."
