‘19 Kids and Counting’ Update: Advertisers Distance Themselves from ‘Jill and Jessa: Counting On’ Spinoff to Avoid Duggar Association

By Carlo Monzon
Duggar Family
The family of Jim Bob Duggar. Wikimedia Commons/Jim Bob Duggar

Various companies are reportedly pulling out their advertisements from the timeslots running with the "19 Kids and Counting" spinoff show, "Jill and Jessa: Counting On." Apparently, these companies don't want anything to do with members of the Duggars family.

According to In Cosmopolitan, a total of seven companies requested television network TLC to remove their ads from the timeslot of "Counting On." These include the UPS Store, Pure Michigan, Verizon Wireless, Cici's Pizza, Whitewave Foods, Mattress Firm and Choice Hotels.

Many of them noted that they don't want to be associated with the show or the Duggars due to the controversy surrounding them.

"Cici's prides itself on being a family-friendly restaurant," a spokesperson for the restaurant chain said according to In Touch Weekly. "We recently made a large advertising buy on cable television that spanned several networks but did not target any particular program. When we learned one of our ads was placed adjacent to controversial programming, we took immediate action to stop it."

"The Pure Michigan ads were not supposed to air during this program, and we were disappointed to hear that they had," a representative for Pure Michigan said. "We contacted TLC immediately after learning about the mistake, and we have been assured no Pure Michigan ads will run on this program moving forward."

"The 'Counting On' program does not meet our brand guidelines," the spokesperson added.

The request of the companies to pull out their ads stem from the issues surrounding "19 Kids and Counting" star Josh Duggar. Some of these include molestation and pornography addiction. This then led to the show's cancellation in July of last year.

Then, in December of the same year, a spinoff program was aired which focused on the lives of Jill and Jessa Duggar and their respective families. Many adult Duggars, except for Josh, also appear on the show.

Originally, the "Jill and Jessa: Counting On" show was only supposed to run for three episodes. According to Nielsen Company's statistics, each episode attracted about two million viewers. Due to the success of the show, it was given the green light for a full season. Its first episode premiered on March 15.

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