Boohoo criticised for selling real fur as faux

By

Barbara Santamaria

Published
Jan 9, 2019

Fast-fashion brand Boohoo has been called out by the Advertising Standards Authority after a jumper listed as faux fur was discovered to contain real animal fur.

The “faux fur pom pom jumper” was flagged by animal welfare charity Human Society International, which purchased a sample and commissioned a test report from an independent textiles analysis expert.  

The results revealed that the sample was real animal fur - most likely rabbit.

“Consumers should be able to trust the ads they see and hear – and they certainly shouldn’t be misled into buying a faux fur product in good conscience only for it to turn out to be from a real animal,” Miles Lockwood, ASA director of complaints, commented.

“That’s not just misleading; it can also be deeply upsetting. Our rulings serve as an important notice to retailers and the clothing and textile industry about the need for truthfulness in their claims around faux fur products, and to get their house in order or face further action.”

Boohoo, which has been criticised for selling faux fur as real before, said it has “robust”  procedures in place to ensure its fur-free policy, and that the product involved in the investigation was obtained from an external UK-based supplier, which had signed a supplier acknowledgement form committing to not supplying products containing real fur.

It also said a proportion of all stock is inspected by an in-house quality control team.