GoDaddy Super Bowl Ad Pulled For Puppy Mill Complaints

The Super Bowl is just around the corner and the first company to come under public backlash for its “insensitive” commercial is GoDaddy.com.

The GoDaddy Super Bowl spot was revealed to the public on Tuesday on a popular talk show and shortly after controversy started to swirl. The company was called out for promoting puppy mills as the ad features an adorable puppy named Buddy being sold online. The 30 second spot begins with Buddy falling out of a truck and struggling to find his way home. Once he does get home he finds out that his owner has sold him using a website set up through the GoDaddy site.

Everyone as chimed in about the advertisement including The SPCA and Peta by taking their criticism online.

Thank you @animalrescuers for the candid feedback. What should have been a fun and funny ad clearly missed the mark and we will not air it.

— Blake Irving (@Blakei) January 27, 2015

GoDaddy CEO Blake Irving even responded to The SPCA criticism stating that the ad would not go to air come Super Bowl Sunday.

Irving then went online to post a longer explanation as to why the company is pulling the ad.

“We’ve made a tremendous amount of progress over the past two years, advancing the GoDaddy brand as a company that cares a great deal about small business and is in their corner to help them succeed. People increasingly know who we are, what we do and who we do it for. At the end of the day, our purpose at GoDaddy is to help small businesses around the world build a successful online presence. We hoped our ad would increase awareness of that cause. However, we underestimated the emotional response. And we heard that loud and clear.

“The net result? We are pulling the ad from the Super Bowl. You’ll still see us in the Big Game this year, and we hope it makes you laugh.”

Buddy the dog (Photo Credit: GoDaddy)

A petition was started online to stop the company from airing the ad and managed to get 42,428 signatures.

Irving says that Buddy came from a reputable and loving breeder in California and he is now a part of the GoDaddy family as their “Chief Companion Officer” and he lives with one of their employees.

This isn’t the first Super Bowl ad to be pulled before game time, just the first one this year. In previous years all sorts of companies from Ashley Madison to Budweiser have had ads deemed too racy or crude for television.