Chelsea's Ivy Asia restaurant apologises after 'culturally insensitive' advert

The Ivy Asia in Chelsea has said sorry after releasing a promotional video for their restaurant, which included racial stereotyping.

The chain opened its newest branch The Ivy Asia on July 30 in Chelsea. To promote the restaurant, they released a promotional video, but since its release it has received wide-spread criticism.

Since the video has been released, many people have been condemning the video as it portrays racial stereotyping, such as women dressed as Geishas. The advert shows the two geishas wanting to get to The Ivy Asia.
 

Throughout, the pair are very animated, falling over a few times, with other people laughing at them.

The Ivy Asia has now deleted the video and has released a statement following the backlash it has received. In the statement it said: "We would like to sincerely apologise for the offence caused by our marketing video. It was wrong. It was done naively and it was totally inappropriate and culturally insensitive. We had a complete ignorance of understanding."

In the statement it also said: "We need to educate ourselves and we are already looking to engage the relevant external bodies to review concept, culture and all internal and external processes".