The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2026
Freis Labo's 'after NHK, sold out' serum ads buried a fake campaign
Tokyo ordered Freis Labo to stop ads claiming explosive post-NHK sales and easy spot removal — claims with no evidence.
Freis Labo · 2026-03-27
What happened
Freis Labo marketed its 'フレイスラボホワイトVCセラム' whitening serum through affiliate websites reached from Instagram ads. The copy led with claims such as '＼NHK放送後、爆売れ中／' (after the NHK broadcast, selling explosively) and '医療機関の皆様、言っちゃいます' (medical professionals, we'll say it), implying that anyone could easily make skin spots disappear in a short time.
It also presented the serum as winning 'No.1' rankings for continued use, expectation and recommendation among vitamin-C whitening serums, and dangled an 'only today, first-come, campaign price of ¥2,980' that was in fact always available at that price.
On 27 March 2026 the Tokyo Metropolitan Government issued an administrative order under the Act Against Unjustifiable Premiums and Misleading Representations, finding violations of Articles 5(1) (superior-quality misrepresentation), 5(2) (advantageous-condition misrepresentation) and 5(3) (stealth marketing, for re-using influencer content as if it were unaffiliated). The company submitted no reasonable-evidence documentation to back the claims.
Why it happened
- Puffing a 'sold out after NHK' emergency that never existed manufactured false urgency
- Claiming No.1 rankings and easy spot removal with no evidence for either
- Presenting a campaign price that was the everyday price, so the deal was a fiction
The lesson
A scarcity claim needs the same proof as an efficacy claim. If the 'sold out' window never closes and the 'result' has no evidence behind it, a regulator only has to screenshot the ad.
Aftermath
Tokyo ordered Freis Labo to notify consumers the displays violated the law, stop the offending representations, and put recurrence-prevention measures in place. The case added a cosmetics seller to the string of orders using the stealth-marketing notice, signalling that 'campaign' and 'No.1' language would be checked as hard as health-effect claims.
Sources
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