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Paper towel wars: Ads for Viva, Scott challenged

CINCINNATI - Procter & Gamble Co. has picked up backing for its challenges to paper towel advertising by Kimberly-Clark Corp.

    by Dan Sewell, ASSOCIATED PRESS
    Published 

CINCINNATI - Procter & Gamble Co. has picked up backing for its challenges to paper towel advertising by Kimberly-Clark Corp.

The advertising industry's self-regulatory body recommends changes in commercials for Viva and Scott paper towels that have possibly misleading messages about absorbency and thickness compared with P&G's Bounty.

Kimberly-Clark, of Dallas, employs more than 800 at a plant in Chester, Delaware County, that produces Scott toilet tissue and Scott paper towels.

The National Advertising Division Council of Better Business Bureaus investigated the separate campaigns after challenges by consumer products maker P&G, based in Cincinnati.

Kimberly-Clark says it disagrees with the findings but will abide by the recommendations.

In one challenged ad, "Sandy" has a team ready to use a giant roll of Viva towels to ram into a consumer's home. She urges her to "Quit the Quilt," referring to Bounty's quilted towels and claiming they have more air, not thickness.