CUSTOMERS HAVE complained to clothing retailer Matalan after the chain used two black children to model monkey outfits.

The photo, which features six white children and two black children, is from a new catalogue on a page advertising children’s animal onesies.

The two black models – both in ape suits – were pictured alongside six white boys and girls dressed as rabbits, a ladybird and a character from the game Angry Birds.

A 40-year-old father reported the image to The Sun, complaining: ‘We’re living in a sensitive time and you’d have thought someone would have realised how bad this is.”

The image also did not go unnoticed on Twitter. It prompted one Twitter user to accuse the firm of racism, while another customer complained the image was extremely unfortunate, deliberate or not.

One user wrote: “Flicking through my @Matalan book & I come across this…they really put the Black kids in the Monkey Onesies?! #Rude.”

Another, Andrew Sneddon, tweeted to the firm: “I’m finding it quite racist.”

The retailer however said it was disappointed the photograph had been perceived in this way, reported the Mail Online.

“We regularly work with the two boys and they chose the outfits they wanted to wear, as did all the other children on the shoot.

“Their parents were with them the whole time and they all really enjoyed the day. It is very sad that some people have turned this into a race issue,” a spokesman said.