The UK’s advertising watchdog has upheld a complaint from Sainsbury’s which claimed that an Aldi ad comparing the prices of their Christmas dinners was “misleading”.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) said the complaint relates to a four-page national press ad published on 6 December 2023.

In the advert Aldi said that its 2022 prices had been "locked” – when not all items in the advert were the same price as the previous year – its Christmas dinner was 20 per cent cheaper than Sainsbury’s, and that the consumer champion Which? had found the supermarket to offer the cheapest Christmas dinner in the UK.

But Sainsbury’s challenged whether these claims could be substantiated, with the ASA agreeing with all three issues the supermarket raised.

The regulator said that Aldi acknowledged that some of the products featured in the advert were not included in the Which? comparison.

The budget supermarket said that featured products were representative only, adding that consumers could easily see which items had been compared by Which? in the article.

Aldi went on to say it had used the “2022 price locked” message throughout the festive season, including adverts that did not refer to the Christmas dinner price campaign.

The German discounter added that all terms and conditions were on its website, claiming it did not believe that customers would interpret the price lock to mean that all products in the Christmas day dinner were price locked.

Retail Systems has reached out to Aldi and Sainsbury’s for comment.

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