Marketing company Glomail has declined to say whether it intends to readvertise fraud convict Kevin Trudeau’s Mega Memory System after being ruled out of line by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).
The supposed memory-training programme has already run foul of United States regulators, and Trudeau has paid thousands of dollars in penalties for making false claims.
The ASA received a complaint about a South African Broadcasting Corporation television infomercial on the product from a man who said it did not work.
It said that, in response, Glomail made a submission on the merits of the matter but also undertook that the infomercial would not be used again ”in its current format”.
The ASA declined to give the South African Press Association (Sapa) a copy of the Glomail submission, saying it does not release the contents of case files.
Asked for a copy, Glomail operations director Tony Austin merely referred Sapa to a website containing a ruling of the US Federal Trade Commission, the body that penalised Trudeau.
”[You] will note that the stipulated order very narrowly circumscribes what statements may be made in any of Mr Trudeau’s advertising for Mega Memory as well as any consulting that Mr Trudeau may involve himself in with respect to infomercial advertising,” Austin said in an email.
He did not reply to questions on whether Glomail would advertise the system again, and if so, how the format would differ.
A staffer at a Glomail outlet in Cape Town said the company was selling the Mega Memory System as a set of seven CDs with an accompanying book, plus a pocket diary, for R699.
Trudeau describes himself as ”the world’s foremost authority on memory-improvement training”. — Sapa