Recommendations for influencer marketing to be HFSS compliant in 2026
Six months on and the HFSS ad ban didn't kill influencer marketing. It killed lazy influencer marketing.
When the UK's restrictions on advertising Less Healthy Food and drink (LHF) finally came into force on 5th January 2026, the predictions were pretty devastating. Food and drink creators could be wiped out. Challenger brands could lose their most effective channel overnight. An entire corner of the influencer economy from the tastings, the menu drops, to the "you have to try this" content that audiences genuinely love could simply disappear.
Six months in, the reality is more interesting and nuanced than the headlines suggested. The rules have genuinely reshaped how brands and creators work together. But they haven't killed food content. What they've killed is the laziest version of it. The straight-to-camera product push that mistook reach for content craft. For anyone willing to think more broadly, the channel is still very much open.
That's not me being insinscere about a real problem. It's what we see every day, and the creators doing the work are telling us.
A quick reminder of what changed...
Two restrictions came into legal force in January, after a voluntary compliance period that ran from October 2025:
- A total ban on paid-for online advertising of identifiable LHF products, at any time of day, regardless of audience age. This explicitly includes paid social AND influencer and creator partnerships, including gifted collaborations where anything of value changes hands
- A 9pm watershed for LHF advertising on TV and on-demand services
A product is only caught if it passes a two-part test: it has to fall within one of 13 specified food categories and score as high in fat, salt or sugar under the Nutrient Profiling Model. Pure brand advertising such as your logo, your story, your values, with no identifiable LHF product in frame is exempt. And, importantly for our world, organic content on a brand's own channels isn't covered by the ban (though it still has to follow the rest of the CAP Code).
That last point matters more than almost anything else, and we'll come back to it.
What's actually happening on the ground?
The first thing to say is that the impact has been wildly uneven and far gentler for adaptable players than the forecasts implied.
Brand and Talent Director, Maddie Ribton (Connect Management) describes the disruption to her roster as "little to no impact," precisely because brands moved quickly to rewrite the rules of engagement rather than walk away. Her examples read like a field guide to compliant creativity: campaigns built around a lettuce burger; soft drink brands shifting spend into in-person activations; sweets brands rolling out content with the packaging deliberately out of shot.
"Brands haven't pulled back - they've adapted. They've come to us with new briefs, new formats, new ways of telling the story. The ones who get it, like Tesco, do it really well."
Maddie, Connect Management.
King of over-the-top-food creations, Oli Paterson (Elburritomonster) tells a similar story, but with a sharper edge. Yes, there was a genuine dip in January, February and March as the market worked out what it could and couldn't do. Around a fifth of the brands he used to work with are now off the table for paid work. And yet, May was the best month of his career.
"The dip was real, but it was a confidence problem, not a demand problem. The biggest issue isn't the regulation - it's the perception of it. Brands and creators are being far more cautious than the rules actually require. I've spent a lot of this year educating brands on what they can still do."
Oli Paterson, Elburritomonster.
His point about over-caution is the one I'd underline for any marketer reading this. The rules are technical, but they're not a blanket ban on the entire food category. Oli describes building a recent McDonald's piece around the parts of the product that aren't HFSS, structuring the content so the compliant elements carry it. That's not a loophole; it's the system working as designed (which the ASA itself has now confirmed).
The case law is already rewriting the playbook...
On 15th April, the ASA published its first four LHF rulings. Two of those four involved influencer campaigns. They're worth knowing, because they turn abstract guidance into something you can brief against.
A paid Instagram post for Lidl's bakery range was upheld as a breach: repeated close-ups, descriptions and tasting footage of a pain suisse (an HFSS product in a restricted category), meant the post promoted an identifiable LHF product, whatever the "brand-led" intention.
A paid Instagram post for a German Doner Kebab opening was not upheld: the creator showed and tasted several menu items, but the brand had the nutrient-profiling evidence to prove those specific products weren't HFSS. No identifiable LHF product, no breach.
The lesson is stark and genuinely useful. The difference between a ruling and a clean campaign often comes down to which products you put in frame and whether you can prove their nutritional profile. Auditing your portfolio for hero or hallmark products that pass the NPM is now a core part of creative planning, not a legal afterthought.
It isn't all upside though, and we shouldn't pretend it is.
For all the adaptation, there are real costs the rules have created, and a written piece that ignores them would be amiss.
The biggest is clarity. The team behind one of YouTube’s food challenger accounts have had to cancel projects since last November, and their frustration is less about the principle than the fog around it.
"The intent behind the rules is clear, and we understand it. What's not clear is the line. Are close-ups out, or is it segment-specific? You end up relying on judgement and common sense and when you're making a living from this, 'use your judgement' doesn't feel like good enough guidance."
There's a structural unfairness too. Brand-led storytelling is a comfortable pivot if you're a multinational with decades of equity in your logo *cough Golden Arches cough*. It's much harder if you're a challenger brand whose entire proposition depends on showing people why your product is different. The rules, in other words, can entrench the incumbents.
And there are practical friction points the legislation never anticipated. Creators tell us that supermarkets have become tricky to film in, with certain spaces off-limits; some brands have retreated almost entirely into formats like podcasts to stay safe. Caution, again, doing more damage than the regulation strictly requires.
So what does good look like now?
Strip away the noise and a clear strategy emerges. One that, frankly, is just better marketing.
- Lead with brand, not product. The exemption for brand advertising is an invitation to tell richer stories about who you are, not a consolation prize
- Own your channels. The paid ban doesn't touch organic content on brand-owned profiles so don't neglect building your own presence and capitalising on GEO / Digital Discoverability
- Audit your portfolio. Know exactly which of your products pass the HFSS ad ban. Your non-HFSS lines can still anchor paid creator work
- Build compliance into the brief, not the legal review. The ASA looks at the whole arrangement from briefs to approvals and documentation when something is challenged. Good process is now a competitive advantage
- Choose partners for the long term. Audience checks, credible engagement and creators who understand the rules matter more than raw reach
The provocation to leave you with...
One observation from Oli has stayed with me, because it points at where this is heading. As the lines between "the product" and "the person promoting it" blur, he wonders whether a creator who isn't perceived as healthy might one day effectively become an HFSS proposition in their own right. That their personal brand will be judged by the same logic as a chocolate bar.
That's speculative. But it captures the real shift underneath all of this. The HFSS rules aren't just a media-buying constraint. They're nudging the entire creator economy away from product-as-hero and towards brand, story, value and trust. The brands and creators who were always going to win on those terms have barely broken stride. The ones relying on lazy, product-first reach are the ones feeling the squeeze.
Six months in, the HFSS ad ban doesn't look like an extinction event. It looks like a correction, and a long-overdue one.