Sainsbury’s has apologised after the company removed a pair of trousers from its online store that contained a “racist insult”.
The company, which owns the clothing brand TU, has been criticised for promoting school trousers with a “knee-length” hem, a phrase reportedly used to disguise a racist insult.
The two pairs of trousers in question are advertised as ‘Grey Skinny Reinforced Knee Grow Hem Trousers 2 Pack’ and ‘Reinforced Knee Grow Hem Woven Trousers 2 Pack’.
Other TU school trousers had various other names, including ‘Skinny Fit Grow Hem’, ‘Longer Leg Grow Hem’ and ‘Generous Fit Woven Grow Hem’.
The company said it was “urgently updating” its product labels after being notified of the issue. “We sincerely apologize for any upset this has caused,” it added.
Sainsbury’s has apologised after removing these trousers from its online store after they were advertised with a perceived racist slur
The company was made aware of the issue after a concerned customer contacted X claiming that the term ‘knee growth’ was allegedly being used as a disguise for a racist slur
The company has begun ‘urgently updating’ its product labels after being made aware of the issue (Stock Photo)
Someone shared a photo of the pants on X and tagged Sainsbury’s. Someone then wrote: ‘Did you know that the product name below is used liberally by racists to bypass n-word filters?
“May I suggest we rename the item. And maybe have some black faces in the decision-making process, to prevent this from happening in the future.” [sic]
The Tweet was viewed 230,000 times.
One viewer commented: ‘Oh my god, that’s horrible. Who the hell came up with that?’
“What the hell is this,” said another user.
Someone else added: ‘I had to read this 3-4 times and thought what are you talking about, what’s the big deal. Then I saw it and now I can’t unsee it. WTAF!’
“What the hell? I can’t believe my eyes. Disgusting,” said another critic.
Another user commented: ‘Had to reread this to see the offensive words. But damn that’s bad!!!!’
“Weird,” agreed someone else.
A spokesman for Tu said: “We sincerely apologize for the upset this has caused.
“We have listened to the concerns raised and are urgently updating the product labeling.”
This came shortly after chaos broke out at Sainsbury’s after a voucher that allowed customers to get all their groceries for free stopped working.
The voucher, which was available via the app on Monday, saw customers flock to their local branch to fill their shopping carts to the brim.
The coupon was quickly removed from the app, but several customers were still able to take advantage of the outage.
Several videos show how customers at different branches made the most of the voucher before the retail giant discovered the error.
Chaos broke out at Sainsbury’s after a voucher glitched that allowed customers to do all their shopping for free. Pictured: A customer showing off his use of the app yesterday
In the White Rose Shopping Centre in Leeds, packed with shops, rows of shopping trolleys were lined up.
An example of the voucher in use: the customer saves £55.84
Some customers mainly wanted to take home basic products such as toilet paper, while others mainly wanted to take home luxury items.
A clip from the Sainsbury’s store in Gants Hill, east London, shows an argument between two customers trying their luck and store staff trying to deny them the voucher.
A Sainsbury’s spokesperson said: ‘We have seen an increase in the number of fraudulent vouchers in our stores and we have processes in place to detect and block these.
“We also have detectives in store monitoring fraudulent attempts and we are working closely with the police on this. We will continue to accept genuine coupons and vouchers.”
