Since 5 January 2026, any business employing 250 or more people has been prohibited from advertising food and drink products classified as high in fat, sugar or salt (HFSS) across paid-for digital media and broadcast television before the 9pm watershed. For large managed pub groups, casual dining chains, quick service operators and hotel food and beverage programmes that meet the staffing threshold, the rules are now active and the clock is running on compliance.
The restrictions apply to paid media placements — social media advertising, video-on-demand pre-rolls, search display and broadcast spots — and extend to any promotion of a specific HFSS product as the primary subject of paid communications. Organic content, editorial coverage and in-venue promotion are not captured by the regulation, but the boundaries matter and the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is the enforcement body.
How products are classified
HFSS classification uses the Food Standards Agency's nutrient profiling model. A food or drink product scoring above a defined threshold across saturated fat, total sugar, sodium and protein content is classified as HFSS. Broadly, this captures most fried items, desserts, confectionery, sweetened soft drinks, most crisps and snack foods, and a substantial proportion of the traditional pub and casual dining menu offer.
The classification operates at product level, not menu level. A restaurant could lawfully advertise its brand, its venue, a seasonal event or a menu category without naming a specific HFSS product — but an advert featuring a specific burger, a named dessert or a high-sugar cocktail as the primary focus, served before 9pm in paid media, is captured.
Who is in scope
The 250-employee threshold is calculated at business entity level, not site level. A managed pub company operating 80 sites with an average of 20 staff each — 1,600 total employees — is in scope regardless of how many people work at the individual venue. Franchise models where the franchisor employs more than 250 people but the franchisee does not should seek specific legal advice on how liability is apportioned, as the position is not straightforward.
For the independent operator — the chef-owner running one site with eight staff — these restrictions do not currently apply. The government has signalled its intention to review the threshold in due course, but for now the regulation targets large-scale operators.
The practical marketing challenge
The most immediate challenge for marketing teams is social media advertising. Instagram and Facebook paid promotion of food and drink content has become a standard tactic for managed hospitality brands, and much of that content — burger launches, cocktail campaigns, dessert features — is HFSS by classification. Scheduling that content to run exclusively after 9pm limits reach; pausing it risks losing competitive visibility during daytime trading hours.
The compliant route is not to stop advertising — it is to restructure campaigns around brand storytelling, occasion advertising (book for brunch, celebrate with us) and menu experiences rather than specific product promotion. This requires a creative shift that some internal teams and agencies are still working through, given how recently the rules came into force.
On-screen menu boards in digital formats visible from outside a venue — where they might be seen by a broad audience including children — are also under review as a category, and the ASA has indicated it will publish guidance on outdoor digital screens later this year.
What non-compliance looks like
ASA enforcement follows a complaint-led model, meaning breaches that are not reported do not automatically trigger investigation. However, competitor complaints, consumer group monitoring and proactive ASA sampling of paid media mean that the realistic window for undetected non-compliance is narrower than some operators may assume.
Sanctions for upheld complaints include mandatory removal of content, public rulings published on the ASA website and referral to Trading Standards for persistent breaches. Reputational exposure — particularly for brands with a consumer-facing profile — is significant even where financial penalties are limited under the current regulatory framework.
For operators who have not yet audited their paid media activity against the HFSS schedule, doing so in the next 30 days is advisable. The regulation is new enough that early-stage engagement with the ASA, where content falls into a grey area, is likely to be met with guidance rather than penalty — but that window will not remain open indefinitely.