[Andy McDandy]

By the way, Runcorn, like many northern towns, is pretty well mixed.

[Youngian]

Black people make up around 4 per cent of the population in England and Wales, according to the 2021 Census.

Is this the first time one of Farage's mob has used a statistic on race and population that's real? I suppose we ought to be thankful she made a moronic backtrack rather than doubling down.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

But only 74% are 'White British', so ads don't seem to be that far off.

Also, brown pound.

[Tubby Isaacs]

The idea that adverts are documents of social realism is bollocks anyway. If they were then, adverts would have lots of obese people on them. Multi-racial adverts are a message of "hey man, our product is for everyone!" It's capitalism. And they get shown to people before they're broadcast. An advert that nobody liked wouldn't get shown.

As someone else said, we see quite a lot of Kevin Bacon on adverts, but Pochin probably doesn't care much about the "over-exposure" of an American.

When you've got no policies that stand up to analysis (and why should they have, nobody in the media cares about that) this is what you get instead. Culture war, where poppies on football boots, the opening ceremony at the French Olympics, flags at Christmas and black people on adverts fill the gap.

[Bones McCoy]

But only 74% are 'White British', so ads don't seem to be that far off.

Also, brown pound.

The brown pound can expand to "What sort of people watch a lot of TV adverts".
We're talking about a "TV frequently on, and usually not BBC" household.
Something increasingly rare, outside pensioner homes and multi-generational housing.

Then consider "Who buys the advertised stuff".
The television has got extremely good at targeting an audience.
When I watch bicycle races there seem to be three strains: Cars, Bike shops (obvs) and Worth Charities (Kids, Donkeys, Guide Dogs).

You probably get a lot more "Multiracial households curating their oven chips" ads during the Entertainment hours.
Soaps, Celebrity reality shows, Tony and Declan.

The Reform lady is reprising a tired old "There goes the neighbourhood" whinge.
One that belongs in the era of Love thy Neighbour.

[Yug]

Then consider "Who buys the advertised stuff".

They do. They might screw their faces up and stamp their tiny feet but none of them will actually boycott a company because of black faces in adverts. They bitch and moan and do a racism, yet still go out and buy the product. If this wasn't true we'd be seeing a lot of all-white adverts. We don't.

[Tubby Isaacs]

They'll probably get on to a boycott of adverts with too many black people at some point.

[Youngian]

The urbane aspirance ad I keep getting is Italian immigrant dad handing over the keys of his restaurant to his English daughter for reviving the business with some interweb commerce stuff. For obvious reasons this ad won't bother Reform MPs but they're too tinned eared to understand its the same lifestyle pitch as busy mixed race family in a large town house. And they still don't out number Ralph Ineson's honest Northern working man voice-over gigs.

[Tubby Isaacs]

And while lots of people in advertising wear silly glasses and live "within the M25", it's a major UK export industry. I'm sure the industry values the advice of business heavyweight, Sarah Pochin, that they're doing it all wrong. Keep your fancy metropolitan elite tax revenue, we don't want it in Runcorn, as Sarah will probably say at some point.

[davidjay]

I know I don't know much about the subject but I thought that advertising was meant to increase sales of a product. If that's the case then why would companies deliberately try to make themselves unpopular? Is it me, or Sarah who doesn't get it?

[Tubby Isaacs]

I guess it's important to nail this stuff down because who knows if Starmer will get up one morning and say "You're right, we're the worst government ever, I'm calling an election now!" Great to have men like Danny Kruger on the Brains Trust.