Miller Pulls Mafia Ads Amid Italian Complaints

Complaints from Chicago’s Italian-American community have prompted MillerCoors to pull a Miller Lite ad campaign in which Sopranos actor Frank Vincent plays a stereotypical Mafia type, the Chicago Sun-Times reports. In the two spots, he asks a store clerk and bartender if they need “protection.” They say they don’t; the protection, the ad says, is in a lid that safeguards taste.

“We seem to be the last breed in America that ad agencies think they can take a shot at,” said the founder of a Chicago Italian-American organization. Groups threatened a Miller boycott if the ads weren’t dumped; MillerCoors says they’ll be gone in days.
(More Miller Lite stories.)