1. INTRODUCTION
Advertising is one of the fastest growing industries in South Africa. It is nearly impossible for any business to survive in today's competitive market without exploiting its potential. But advertisements may exert a negative influence as well on customers and affect the moral fabric of the society in a negative manner which begs the question who will protect the everyday consumer. However some people argue that advertisements provide information about the product attributes which helps to foster a healthy economy. Within this competitive industry a lot of levers or tricks are employed by agencies to gain competitive advantage over similar products or brands these and other challenges that face industry and consumers alike will be explored in the following assignment.
2. WHAT IS THE POSSIBLE RESIDUAL IMPACT OR INFLUENCE OF ADVERTISING ON CONSUMERS?
The consumer affairs act 71 of 1988, aims to protect the consumer ,according to S.S.Nel et al(1997)” it is essentially oriented towards protecting consumers and makes provision for the prohibition or control of certain business practices which are regarded as unfair because they prejudice consumers or deceive consumers.” ?
The major negative influence of certain advertisements on customers is that they promote materialism. By trying to prove that 'material possession' would lead to 'social acceptance' and popularity they encourage people to focus only on material aspects of life (Belch et al, 2001:76).According to(Geist, 2005) Jetta's (Volkswagen) advertisement campaign focused more on life style theme rather than the product. Furthermore it is claimed by the commercials that all problems of a person's life can be eliminated by 'application of some external force - the use of a product' (Mohan, ...