Children's Advertising Review Unit Recommends MrBeastYouTube, LLC and Feastables Improve Ad Disclosures, Product Claims, and Data Collection Practices Date: September 18, 2025 Location: New York, NY BBB National Programs’ Children’s Advertising Review Unit (CARU) reviewed advertising and data practices of MrBeastYouTube, LLC and its affiliate Feastables, following concerns about compliance with CARU's Advertising Guidelines, Privacy Guidelines, and COPPA. --- Background MrBeast (Jimmy Donaldson): One of the world’s most popular YouTube content creators with over 400 million subscribers. Feastables: A chocolate brand launched by MrBeast in 2022, generating over $215 million revenue in 2024. CARU's focus was on: Identifiability of advertising on MrBeast’s YouTube channel. Truthfulness of product claims for Feastables chocolate bars. Disclosure of sweepstakes rules, free entry options, odds, and age requirements. Compliance with data collection and parental consent requirements under COPPA. --- Key Findings and Recommendations MrBeast YouTube Advertising Some video descriptions and pinned comments contained advertising not clearly labeled as ads. Children wouldn’t recognize these as advertising. CARU’s Recommendation: Ensure all advertising on the channel is clearly identifiable as such to children. Feastables Advertising A promotional video (later removed) showed a “blind taste test” where Feastables bars were preferred over "top European chocolates." Although MrBeast said this was not serious, CARU found it misleading to children, implying a valid consumer preference. CARU’s Recommendation: Ensure product claims are truthful and not misleading to children. Feastables Sweepstakes Practices Blue Wave $10K Sweepstakes: Advertisement suggested needing to buy chocolate to enter, but a free method of entry was only mentioned in a FAQ page deep on the site. Minimum age requirement (16) disclosed only in FAQ. Advertising gave impression children must purchase bars; also encouraged buying multiple bars to increase entries. Halloween $10K Sweepstakes (2024): Allowed up to 24 entries daily for chance at $10,000 and a $1 million grand prize. Small-print disclaimer about "no purchase necessary" and age minimum 13 with parental permission. No age gates or convenient mechanisms to obtain verifiable parental consent (VPC) for under-13 entrants. Pre-checked affirmations on entry forms. Countdown timer induced sales pressure. CARU Findings: Sweepstakes did not clearly and conspicuously disclose free entry methods, age limits, or odds of winning as required. Promotions encouraged overconsumption of chocolate. Lack of age screening and VPC mechanisms potentially violated COPPA and CARU Privacy Guidelines. CARU’s Recommendations: Clearly disclose all material sweepstakes information to children in understandable language. Include neutral and effective age screening. Separate sweepstakes and promotional marketing should avoid encouraging overconsumption. Ensure truthfulness, clarity, and appropriateness of advertising. Privacy & Data Collection Issues Feastables website used popups requiring email and phone number; data was shared with third parties. Website appeals to children under 13 as a secondary audience but lacks mechanisms to prevent collection of their personal information without VPC. CARU recommends considering age gates on future promotions, especially as Feastables plans to restrict future sweepstakes to ages 18+. --- Response and Cooperation MrBeast and Feastables have cooperated with CARU to implement recommendations. In a statement, they acknowledged CARU's mission but disagreed with some conclusions and indicated certain problematic practices have been discontinued. They commit to considering CARU’s concerns in future children's