ElfBar Ads Pulled for Misleading Recycling Claims

Advertisements for the vaping company ElfBar in the UK have been banned after using the slogan “recycling for a greener future” over concern they were misleading due to the environmental damage of discarded disposable vapes.

A study by Material Focus shows that 260 million disposable vapes were thrown away in the UK in 2022, making them a leading cause of the rise in plastic pollution in recent years.

The ad, banned by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), gave the impression that recycling ElfBar products was easy and could be done at home.

Vaping products cannot generally be home-recycled; they must be taken to special facilities such as council-run waste centers, according to the Guardian.

The ads appeared on buses and digital billboards in London in July and August. They carried images of the Elf Bar 600 V2 vape alongside the words “recycling for a greener future” and “green awareness.”

Both ads were the subject of complaints to the regulator by Adfree Cities and others.

The ASA instructed ElfBar to ensure that the ads must not appear again in the forms complained of; and that future campaigns did not mislead the public about the environmental impact or benefit of the products.

James Ward, a campaigner at Adfree Cities, called for a total ban on advertising nicotine vapes. “Just as cigarettes scar the bodies of smokers, so has the rise in popularity of disposable vapes left a toxic legacy of plastic and harmful battery metals on our environment,” he said.