Gourmet Burger Kitchen (GBK) has decided to take down a number of adverts today (18 January 2016) after many people branded the campaign 'offensive', particularly to vegans and vegetarians. Adverts carrying slogans such as 'You'll always remember when you gave up being a vegetarian' above a picture of a GBK receipt have prompted angry reactions on social media and complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority.

People unhappy at the adverts have been sharing their thoughts on social media using the hashtag '#gourmetmurderkitchen'.

Some people mocked up their own adverts in the same style to respond to the campaign, changing the burger chain's messages into slogans for vegetarianism such as 'You'll always remember when your customer base realised that eating dead bodies was barbaric'.

GBK responded to the outcry on social media with a post saying they had "made the decision to take down some of the adverts", saying that its intentions were light-hearted and that the chain has always catered for vegetarian diets.

We've been reading the reaction to our latest advertising campaign and needless to say, we're quite taken aback. The...

Posted by Gourmet Burger Kitchen on Monday, January 18, 2016

For many the apology came too late, and some said they still planned to boycott GBK. One Twitter user suggested the apology could be read as "we've always catered for you so you should be grateful".

IBTimes UK made attempts to contact GBK and confirm its response, but as yet have been unable to speak to anybody at the company.

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