KFC's 'Only this Friday' ad aired in a week with no Friday deal — ARB ruled it misleading

The product was the R159 Kentucky Fridays special: eight pieces of chicken, two large chips and four mini loaves, pitched as a R75 saving, with a 1.5-litre Coke No Sugar add-on for R5. The TV commercial opened with the words 'Kentucky Fridays' and a voice-over saying 'Only at KFC. Only this Friday.' The only date qualifier — 'Selected Fridays' — sat in small lettering at the bottom right of the closing scene, on screen for roughly one second beneath a busy frame of food and large promotional text, alongside a general terms-and-conditions line.

The campaign ran across DStv channels from 5 to 21 August 2026, with 212 spots booked on KykNET, Moja Love, Moja 9.9, Mzansi Wethu, Mzansi Magic, Mzansi Bioskop, Stay On 2 and Switch'd On Channel 110. The spots were scheduled on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays to build awareness ahead of promotional dates — but the booking window included the week of 10 to 14 August, when the special was not available on the Friday. A customer who saw the ad on 13 August tried to buy the deal the following day, Friday 14 August, and was turned away.

KFC argued the 'Selected Fridays' disclaimer and the online terms made the restrictions clear, and that a 10-second commercial could not carry more detail. In a decision dated 28 September 2026, the ARB Directorate rejected that: the prominent promise and the small-print qualification conflicted, and a reasonable viewer hearing 'Only this Friday' between Saturday and Thursday would expect the deal on the first Friday that followed.

The Directorate found viewers were unlikely to notice, let alone read, a one-second disclaimer while also processing the price, the meal contents and the Coke offer. It questioned why KFC had used 'Only this Friday' at all when availability rested on predetermined dates, and said the company could have stated those dates prominently or simply written 'available on selected Fridays'.

No fine: the ARB upheld the complaint under Clause 4.2.1, and the promotion had already ended by the 28 September 2026 decision.

The voice-over's promise ('Only this Friday') and the small print ('Selected Fridays') contradicted each other, and the regulator weighted the prominent claim, not the disclaimer.

The disclaimer appeared for about one second in a visually busy closing scene — structurally invisible even though it was legally present.

Ads were booked Wednesdays to Fridays across a three-week window, which guaranteed airing in the one week (10–14 August) when the deal was not on the Friday.

KFC treated a disclaimer plus online terms as a substitute for stating the actual dates, which the Directorate rejected for a time-bound offer.

A headline promise and its small-print qualifier cannot point in opposite directions: if the ad says 'only this Friday', the deal must be on that Friday — or the dates belong in the headline.

The ARB did not order the commercial withdrawn — the promotion had ended and the Directorate assumed the advert was no longer in use. It encouraged KFC to communicate promotional restrictions prominently in future campaigns, or to schedule advertisements to coincide with the dates offers were actually available. The misleading finding applied only to the week of 10 to 14 August 2026; the same claim was accurate during the weeks of 3 to 7 and 17 to 21 August, when the special was on the advertised Friday. No penalty was imposed.