Struggling U.K. commercial broadcasters breathed a sigh of relief in September, when regulators officially sanctioned product placement.
But now the sigh has become one of frustration. Regulators have recently announced that junk food and alcohol are excluded from the new rules, banning many potentially lucrative placement deals with household-name brands, which are also among the most sophisticated marketers.
"It doesn't come as a surprise that product placement will be tightly regulated," said Daniel Knapp, an analyst at Screen Digest. "We can see that from the heated public debate -- on the one side, broadcasters who are desperate to stay afloat, and on the other side, consumers wary of the looming epidemic of obesity and alcoholism -- the government, as a mediator, had to find a compromise. Here it will be modest, and not as 'in your face' as it is in the U.S."
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