SPAIN Law and Practice Contributed by: Rubén Canales and Ignacio Temiño, Abril Abogados
10. Product Compliance 10.1 Regulated Products The following products are specifically regulated in Spain: • Alcohol: Advertising of alcoholic beverages is prohibited: (a) with an alcohol content exceeding 20% on television except between 01:00 and 05:00; (b) with an alcohol content exceeding 20% in places where its sale and consumption are prohibited; (c) with an alcohol content of less than 20% when broadcast on television outside the period 20:30 to 05:00, unless such advertising forms an indivisible part of the broadcast content; and (d) that promotes irresponsible consumption or consumption associated with enhanced physi - cal performance, vehicle driving, social suc - cess or health*. • Tobacco: It is prohibited to advertise or promote tobacco products across all media platforms. Broadcasting of programmes or images featuring people smoking or showing trade marks, trade names or signs associated with tobacco products is prohibited across all media platforms. However, the law provides some exceptions for advertis - ing in tobacco shops and in publications aimed at tobacco trade professionals. • Therapeutic Goods and Services: Regulations on advertising and promotion of products, activities and services with intended health purposes estab - lish a series of restrictions and bans relating to advertising products, materials, substances, ener - gies or methods that are announced and presented as useful for diagnosis, prevention or treatment of diseases, weight loss change or correction of physical or psychological conditions or physiologi - cal and other alleged health purposes. Any prod - uct, material, substance, energy or method that claims preventive, diagnostic or therapeutic pur - poses must meet the claims being promised and is subject to authorisations or controls according to the General Health Law and the Medicines Act. • Food: Spanish legislation contains a series of regulations on food safety and nutrition as well as
on health claims made in advertising. Among other restrictions, the presentation and advertising of food must not mislead consumers as to: (a) the product’s characteristics; (b) the product’s properties or effects; (c) any “special” characteristics (when possessed by all similar products); and (d) products’ preventive, therapeutic or healing properties. • Gambling: Gambling operators must have an authorisation certificate. This certificate should authorise the gambling operator’s advertising, sponsorship or promotion. Moreover, the Code of Conduct on Advertising of Gambling Activities imposes additional rules on game operators. Under the Code, gambling operators must meet the prin - ciples of veracity, legality and loyalty. In general: (a) The advertisement should include a responsi - ble gambling message. (b) The commercial communications of the game operators must respect the principle of social responsibility. They may not be directly or in - directly addressed to minors and must include a message that minors may not participate in gambling activities, such as “no minors”, “18+” or similar. (c) The following are forbidden: (i) sponsorship of sporting events; (ii) use of the name, trade mark or commer - cial name of a game operator to identify sports facilities or any leisure centre; (iii) to substitute or add to the name of a sports team or competition, the name or company name of a game operator; and (iv) sponsorship on sports jerseys or equip - ment; (d) Operators may only advertise to their own cus - tomers. Promotions to attract new customers are prohibited. (e) The appearance in commercial communica - tions of people or characters of public rel - evance or notoriety, whether real or fictional, is prohibited. (f) Commercial communications sent by postal mail are prohibited. (g) Commercial communications by game opera - tors in audiovisual communication services may only be broadcast between 01:00 and
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