The Advertising Standards Authority has dismissed a complaint about a WWF UK snow leopard adoption insert in a children’s magazine, recognising the charity’s claim that the advert was designed to appeal to adults.

The leaflet, which carried the phrase ‘Adopt a snow leopard. Save a species’ and featured pictures of cuddly toy snow leopards, was distributed in Moshi Monster magazine. WWF UK explained in the leaflet that snow leopards face extinction, and that supporting the charity is a way of protecting the species for the future.

WWF UK has distributed nearly two million leaflets in Moshi Monster magazine, but this is the first and only complaint it has received about its advertising.

The ASA today rejected the complaint, agreeing with WWF UK’s defence that the advertisement was not intended to appeal to children. The charity said that a significant proportion of animal adopters are women with young children, and the muted design appealed to that market, not children.

The publisher of Moshi Monsters, SkyJack Publishing, backed the WWF, noting that it would be the parent who decided whether or not to donate to the charity and that WWF also prohibited donations from minors.

The regulator agreed that most of the information in the leaflet was factual, and did not exploit children’s desire to help charity.