If you want to judge a society you should observe what TV ads appeal to it. It will tell you a lot about the moral fibre of viewers. Of course, it may only tell you about the values of the marketing companies, but you have to concede that along the line, after the ad men created the ad, the manufacturers must have approved the commercial. So both manufacturers and marketing had to agree on the ethics of the campaign.
In this case, I feel entitled to blame the manufacturers of Smiths Crisps who are originally an Australian company founded by a Mr Smith, but which is now owned by Pepsi.
The advertisement which has distressed me is the one which shows an elderly woman opening the door to a repairman who has come to fix her stairlift. He enters and places his open tool box on the floor. She notices that he has a packet of Smiths Crisps in it. This old lady wants some and when the repairman closes the tool box she steals a part of the stairlift.
When he sits down on the stairlift and turns it on to test it, it shoots upstairs and ejects him out of the window. She then chuckles to herself and steals the packet of Smiths Crisps.
The final scene of the commercial portrays the old crone cheerfully munching on the crisps.
Is that funny or is that funny?
Wow! What a distressing depiction of old age! The worst aspect of this commercial is that it condones violence and theft.
Shame on Smiths, shame on Pepsi, shame on the marketers and shame on the TV channels who didn’t have the moral fibre to reject this tasteless ad.
LiliGans.com 
I have a 100 year aged neighbour. She is not violent nor a thief, The current advert about the old woman and the tradie is disgusting. It is insulting and demeaning to all older women who have the financial resources to pay for their own snacks.
Tradies do not usually snack when busy at work. They have their breaks for that. Obviously Smiths
prefer to use an advertiser who has no moral responsibility or ethics.
There is no need for the tradie to bring the snack in his toolbox. Utter garbage.
Put really obese tattoed women who do buy Smiths chips on the television. I see them do it often.
Perhaps the consumption of Smiths products is the cause of so much Diabetes. Very likely.
Any advert which reflects sadly on people reflects badly on the company doing the advertising.
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Thank you for showing the story of the repairman and the old lady. I feel insulted as well and am not yet the age of her or my very old neighbour 100 plus. Resentment and mistreatment of women is alive and well in our society and some foolish types say things about equality.
Is there is any equality then next time put an aged male in the advert and make a fool of him. Add an advertising executive instead of a tradie and send him to hell.
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What is lost on the audience of the Smiths Crisps version of this advert is that the repair man is the former England football captain and now football tv anchor, Gary Linekar. All they have done is replace the Walkers crisp branding with Smiths. The joke is on Linekar who has been advertising Walkers crisps for at least 20 years. He won’t let people get near Walkers crisps so the fact the old lady wins this time is a positive just lost if one hasn’t seen 20 years worth of adverts! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GbFEnGExSgI
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The advert requires one to have a sense of humour 😉
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