{"id":40912,"date":"2020-11-27T12:58:04","date_gmt":"2020-11-27T12:58:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thevoiceoflondon.co.uk\/?p=40912"},"modified":"2020-11-27T12:58:04","modified_gmt":"2020-11-27T12:58:04","slug":"tesco-sparks-controversy-after-removing-black-couple-from-advert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/tesco-sparks-controversy-after-removing-black-couple-from-advert\/","title":{"rendered":"Tesco sparks controversy after removing black couple from advert"},"content":{"rendered":"

The supermarket chain\u2019s ‘Food Love Stories’ ad has been criticised for its lack of inclusivity, after only featuring Caucasian actors and removing Black actors.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Vanessa Vanderpuye, the actress who was removed in the final cut of the advert, called out the supermarket giant for their decision and also stated that she had to do her own hair on set.<\/span><\/p>\n

In a video posted on Instagram, Vanderpuye said: \u201cI\u2019m always the token black girl and I always have a white husband with me, which for me is progress.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

“Three years ago, my afro wasn\u2019t desirable,” she continued; “they wanted me to suppress it on screen; so to be cast as a dark-skinned couple for the new Tesco commercial, I was so excited because I had never seen that.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Vanessa explains what the significance of featuring in the Tesco advert as part of a dark-skinned Black couple, with her beautiful Afro hair, would’ve been. \u2935\ufe0f pic.twitter.com\/kCzD0zWbOt<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Nadine White (@Nadine_Writes) November 18, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A spokesperson for Tesco said: \u201cOur Food Love Stories campaign has featured more than 70 stories from people of all backgrounds. We were sorry to hear that Vanessa was unhappy with the way our advert was edited, we immediately reached out to her to explain the reasons and process behind the decision.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The supermarket also denies that the decision to cut the couple was based on race and stated that none of the actors received hairstyling for the shoot.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tesco\u2019s decision to not include the Black couple comes after rivals Sainsbury\u2019s was criticised for only including a black family in its ‘Gravy Song’ Christmas advert. <\/span><\/p>\n

Whilst the supermarket was praised for its choice of actors, it received criticism on social media for its lack of inclusivity, despite being one of three adverts for this particular campaign.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

At Sainsbury’s, we want to be the most inclusive retailer. That’s why, throughout all our advertising we aim to represent a modern Britain, which has a diverse range of communities. We have three stories of three different families in our advertising. Chris<\/p>\n

\u2014 Sainsbury’s (@sainsburys) November 14, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Well done Sainsbury\u2019s for making an ad with people who look like me. A loving father who embarrasses his daughter and claims kitchen genius because of one thing he makes well,” said one user on Twitter.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u2018i don\u2019t feel represented by the sainsbury\u2019s ad\u2019<\/p>\n

sorry i didn\u2019t know that the uk was inhabited by carrots, dragons and blue aliens pic.twitter.com\/Q3aJ9MubwP<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 mollie (@roxbruhxo) November 19, 2020<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Words: Omega Kamombo\u00a0| Subbing: Anuj Datta<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The supermarket chain\u2019s ‘Food Love Stories’ ad has been criticised for its lack of inclusivity, after only featuring Caucasian actors and removing Black actors.\u00a0 Vanessa Vanderpuye, the actress who was removed in the final cut…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":476,"featured_media":40916,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[1882,6014,6141],"class_list":["post-40912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-diversity","tag-supermarket","tag-tesco"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/476"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40912\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40916"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}