Lydia Parnes and Ben Chandler Appointed to the Outside Advisory Board of the DISCUS Code of Responsible Practices for Beverage Alcohol Advertising and Marketing
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (DISCUS) announced today that Lydia Parnes, former director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection (BCP) at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and Ben Chandler, former attorney general and U.S. House representative for Kentucky, have been appointed as Outside Advisory Board members to the DISCUS Code of Responsible Practices for Beverage Alcohol Advertising and Marketing.
“Lydia and Ben have both dedicated their careers to strengthening consumer protections and are incredibly well-respected leaders in their respective fields,” said DISCUS Chief Legal Officer Courtney Armour. “We’re delighted to be able to call upon their collective expertise to help guide the development and enforcement of our self-regulatory advertising code for years to come.”
Lydia Parnes, who recently retired as a partner from Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, is a highly regarded privacy and consumer protection expert. As director of the BCP, Parnes oversaw a wide range of consumer protection enforcement and policy development including privacy and data security enforcement, the development of the FTC’s approach to online advertising, and efforts that led to the development of industry self-regulation of children’s food and beverage advertising.
“I am honored to join the DISCUS Advisory Board along with Lynne Omlie and Ben Chandler. Industry self-regulation is a mainstay of effective self-regulation,” said Parnes. “The distilled spirits industry should take pride in DISCUS’ long standing and impressive self-regulatory efforts.”
Ben Chandler served as Kentucky attorney general from 1996-2004 and the United States representative for Kentucky’s 6th Congressional District from 2004 to 2013. Most recently, he served as the president and chief executive officer of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, a nonprofit policy advocacy organization working to address unmet health needs of Kentuckians.
The DISCUS Code’s Outside Advisory Board, established in 2003, provides confidential guidance and pre-reviews advertisements upon request by spirits companies. The outside advisors also serve as tiebreakers if the Code Review Board cannot reach a decision on a particular complaint.
Parnes and Chandler will be joined by Lynne Omlie, who continues to serve as the third advisor on the board. Omlie formerly served as DISCUS senior vice president and general counsel, staff at the FTC and spent more than three decades as the DISCUS Code Review Board staff liaison.
With these appointments, three former advisors have retired from their longstanding roles on the Outside Advisory Board including Jodie Bernstein, former director of the BCP and a leading force in creating the Nation Advertising Review Council of the Better Business Bureaus; Dr. Constantine W. Curris, former president of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, with more than 38 years of higher education experience; and Richard Gitter, former broadcast network executive with 25 years’ experience overseeing advertising standards and compliance for the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) and the American Broadcasting Company (ABC).
“DISCUS is immensely grateful to our former advisors, Jodie, Constantine and Rick for their more than two decades of valuable guidance on the Outside Advisory Board,” said Armour.
The DISCUS Code, first adopted in 1934, covers both the responsible placement and content of beverage alcohol advertising and marketing materials, as well as provides detailed digital and media buying guidelines.
Through the voluntary provisions in the Code, DISCUS members have held themselves to a standard higher than mandated by any law or regulation. Over the decades, there has been 100% compliance by DISCUS members with Code Review Board decisions and overwhelming compliance by non-DISCUS members.
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