Let the Stellar Seller Beware

The FTC means to hold endorsers liable for false pitches

If advertising had existed two millenniums ago, Caesar would surely have endorsed chariots, Cleopatra barges and Cicero throat lozenges. It does exist today, and it offers about as easy money as celebrities can make, whether they be Catherine Deneuve purring for a perfume, James Garner clicking away for a camera company, or Joe Namath and Joe DiMaggio rustling something up in the kitchen. The right match of personality and product must pay off, since advertisers regularly provide the stars fees of $100,000 for a brief pitch and $1 million contracts for long-run identification are not unknown.

But as of last week, there are some new rules; in a bold decision, the Federal Trade Commission announced that henceforth it will try to hold celebrities personally liable for any false claims made in the ads that they grace--and make them pay out of their own pockets part of any legal penalties that might be assessed.

The FTC's first target was, of all people, that exemplar of wholesomeness Pat Boone. With Daughter Debbie he appeared on TV to claim that all four of his daughters had found a preparation named Acne-Statin a "real help" in keeping their skins clear. The FTC has filed a complaint against the manufacturer, Karr Preventative Medical Products, Inc., of Beverly Hills, contending that the product does not really keep skin free of blemishes. Last week it got Boone to sign a consent order in which he promised not only to stop appearing in the ads but to pay about 2.5% of any money that the FTC or the courts might eventually order Karr to refund to consumers. Boone said through a lawyer that his daughters actually did use Acne-Statin, and that he was "dismayed to learn that the product's efficacy had not been scientifically established as he believed."

Though it admitted that the order does not constitute a legally binding precedent, the FTC clearly is out to establish a general rule. Commenting on the order against Boone, the director of the FTC'S Bureau of Consumer Protection warned of "some basic obligations which other celebrities would be well advised to follow in the future" if they want to avoid the same kind of trouble. A celebrity, said the FTC, must verify the claims made in any commercial before it appears, hiring reliable independent analysts to study them if the star has no expertise in the subject. Following those rules might be easy enough for Farrah Fawcett-Majors; any independent analyst would confirm that she looks ravishing wearing Faberge cosmetics. But can O.J. Simpson really be sure that Hertz makes rental cars available as quickly as he says in those airports he hurdles through?

The ruling undoubtedly will make stars more wary about what products they tell an adoring public to buy. Says Los Angeles Agent Marty Ingels, who has lined up endorsements for many: "The deals that are pending are suspended; and the ones I've done, the celebrities are screaming. Where does a ruling like this stop? Is Morris the cat going to be leaned on?" Manhattan Adman Lloyd Kolmer predicts heavy haggling over those endorsements that are signed. Stars will demand that manufacturers indemnify them against product-liability suits--the equivalent of malpractice insurance. Unglamorous, maybe, but better than forking over part of that fat fee to misled admirers.

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