Domino's promised 'under 600kcal' — wrong nutrient data got the ads banned

In January 2026 Domino's launched its 'Cheeky Little Pizza' range in the UK — £4 pizzas pitched as a lower-calorie option made with reduced-fat cheese. The ads said 'JUST £4', 'CHEEKY LITTLE PIZZAS' and 'UNDER 600KCAL': a TV spot aired around 7:45pm, the same ad ran on ITVX, Channel Four, UKTV and Prime Video between 9am and 9pm, and a paid YouTube ad promoted the £4 lunch menu. The campaign had been cleared: third-party nutrient profiling had scored the Sausage and Bacon variant at three, below the HFSS threshold.

The problem was Domino's own figures. When the ASA made contact, Domino's admitted the energy figure used in the nutrient profiling was incorrect — the Sausage and Bacon pizza was in fact HFSS, a 'less healthy' product under the pizza category. Clearcast and the on-demand operators had cleared and scheduled the ads in good faith on the wrong data Domino's supplied. Domino's withdrew all advertising for the range immediately and reviewed its nutritional assessment process.

On 22 July 2026 the ASA upheld all three complaints. The ads depicted an identifiable less-healthy product in realistic imagery, so no brand-advertising exemption applied: the YouTube ad breached the ban on paid online ads for identifiable less-healthy foods, and the TV and VOD versions breached the rule against scheduling such ads before 9pm. The ads must not appear again in those forms, and Domino's was told to provide accurate nutrient profile information to Clearcast.