Know Thy Breaks
Posts tagged Pepsico
Aur Ye… Dhoni ke Sher Hue Phir Dher!
Apr 14th
Tag line: My Pepsi, My Way
Client: Pepsico
Creative Agency: JWT
Exec Creative Director: Soumitra Karnik
Creative Director: Prasoon Pandey
Producer: Cyrus Pagdiwallah
Production House: Corcoise Films
Duration: 70 secs
Year: 2009
Would you ever challenge ace cricketers at their own game? That too in a newer format of the game? Bewildered? So that’s exactly what this Pepsi TVC is all about! Watch Pepsi changing the rules of India’s greatest passion as it has brought together the five popular cricketers- MS Dhoni, Virender Sehwag, Ishant Sharma, Robin Uthappa and Praveen Kumar from the cricket field to the spectacular backwaters of Kerala.
The TVC of Pepsi’s ‘My can’ shows the vacationing cricketers who are challenged by a group of local fisher boys at their own game (to solve a dispute over Pepsi cans). Subsequently they are shown slugging it out over an impromptu cricket match. The young locals who challenge them to it manage to get away with the prize- a boat full of Pepsi cans.
It had been a long time since Pepsi got it right. The ad has great production value, it has been shot in a decent location & starts out with a great promise, but only to fizzle out as a predictable joke, which makes people say “Oh no! Not again!” It’s a good thought & people are likely to identify with the ad. As the cricketers had just gone & lost the Champion’s Trophy just before the film’s released (in Sep’ 2009) & now they get their Pepsi cans too taken away, …people are going to think, “Served you bloody right!”
Fisher boys (representing Indian youth here) take on the five cricketers and manage to fluke on-vacation cricketers to net the Pepsi cans. It denotes their audacious self belief that ‘If you can’t beat them, dupe them’ & when it’s for Pepsi My Can then… ‘I can’. And why not? Youth get what they want in their own, unmatched way.
Probably, the constant change in brand ambassadors and involving the youth icons of the Gen-next, be it actors or cricketers– in every new campaign justifies Pepsi’s core idea of staying young. Through the TVC and the campaign line of ‘My Pepsi, My Way’, brand Pepsi is provoking today’s youth to take on any situation and use their mental smarts to effortlessly find their way through any given situation.
Pepsi’s Wants To WOW! Youngistaan
Apr 7th
Tagline: Youngistaan Ka Wow
Client: Pepsico
Creative Agency: JWT
Executive Creative Director: Soumitra Karnik
Creative Director: Charu Chhitwal
Duration: 45 secs
Year: 2010
Background: Ranbir Kapoor takes the Youngistaan campaign further, by adding WOW to it. This time round for Pepsi, he plays a youngster who goes to extreme lengths to get the last Pepsi. That too, the last Pepsi reserved for the President at his mansion which is under tight security & surveillance. How he goes about it through such a scene is what makes the TVC interesting. As soon as he picks the bottle up(to drink it), some security personnel orders him to take it to the President. But on his way, Ranbir hides behind a column & pretends to mix something to the drink. This is caught on CCTV cameras. Therefore the officer stops Ranbir & asks him to drink that Pepsi. Now as Kapoor effortlessly had outsmarted the security officials and gets to drink the Pepsi in the end followed by the VO saying ‘Youngistaan ka Wow’.
Comments & Insights: In 2008, Pepsi has introduced the concept of Youngistaan. Within two years, Youngistaan has become a term that encapsulates today’s youth & has branded this young, confident generation. Pepsi’s latest baseline “Youngistaan ka WOW” is the voice of the youth resonating their unique ideas, opinions, attitudes, knowledge and actions. It is a feeling that is racing through every youthful nerve in the country today. The anthem (playing on the TVC & Radio) celebrates the audacious self-belief of the youth who are go-getters, making things happen their way.
The drink, this time, is positioned to not just be refreshing but the one which gives audacious self belief of the youth that helps them overcome obstacles/conventions and create a WOW. The belief with which they are able to make things happen while doing things their own way.
JWT is capable of so much better, this campaign doesn’t fair too well… and nor it’s even funny. The first alien ad of Youngistan was so much better and worth discussing. When the concept of Youngistaan was introduced in 2008, with Shah Rukh Khan the existing brand ambassador being put together with Ranbir Kapoor in the Youngistaan commercial.
To my mind, better thought could have captured the spirit of youth… Youngistaan ka WOW sounds like a loaded statement which leaves one to wonder what is Youngistaan ka WOW all about? Youngistaan in itself could have been leveraged to the hilt rather than adding another dimension too it.
Plus, this ad shows Pepsi is drunk by waiters/butlers. So the rivals can come up with an ad saying ‘Pepsi toh waiters peete hain!!’
Now the Mango Pleasure Teleports You to Your Dream Destinations
Apr 3rd
Tagline: Pure Pleasure Holidays
Client: Pepsico
Creative Agency: JWT
Creative Director: Vinod P Vijay
Production House: Red Ice Productions
To strengthen its positioning as an “indulgent” drink, Slice – PepsiCo’s mango juice drink, kick-started a promotional campaign which gives consumers a chance to win an all-expense-paid holiday to various European destinations by looking under the label of Slice 500ml PET bottle.
The TVC, featuring brand ambassador Katrina Kaif begins with Kaif heading towards a bathtub full of floating mangoes ready to relax, refresh and indulge herself. The ‘rasiya’ soundtrack (used in the earlier Slice campaigns) sets up the indulgent mood, as she steps into the tub and sips her Slice. The taste figuratively transports her into a different world and she emerges to find herself at the most pleasurable destinations across Europe, like romantic Paris, the city of canal & Gondolas- Venice & the country of legends- Greece. More >
